ROTR - What's it really like?

What’s it really like?

The typical tour runs 70 days, travels through 13 states, and goes about 13,000 miles. You can find a tour schedule at www.colts.org. When it comes to tour, it’s like running away to join the circus – a circus that travels on an Army schedule. You’ve seen the pictures of the circus train carrying everything the show needs. Now put the animals and the acrobats under a very controlled schedule and there you have it.

To some, this handbook makes tour sound too much like trench warfare in World War I – no sleep, no showers, long days, sore feet, 100-degree heat. To others, we don’t emphasize enough how much dedication and self-denial it really takes to work a week or two on tour with a world-class drum corps.

Typical comments from cook staff after last year’s tour:

I think overall the handbook needs to be a little less ‘breezy’ and a little more blunt. i.e., “Most of your time will be spent working or sleeping – mostly working. There will be surprisingly little time just to hang with your kid, do personal shopping or laundry or take care of yourself at all.”

Compare that to this reaction:

One thing is that we may want to add something to temper the message of considerable sleep loss, lack of shower, very long hours, etc. just a little bit. We need the message to be clear that it’s very demanding work, but not so much that we scare people away – a fine line, I know.

What we try to do is balance the sometimes overwhelming reality of life on the road (one person suggested “maybe add another statement in the Q&A section like: “Will I have time on tour to do my nails, catch up on my reading, curl my hair…??” No need to. In case you hadn’t guessed, all the answers are: NO.) with the overwhelmingly rewarding feeling we all get when the corps takes the field and we’re a little part of it, the fun we all have, and the lifelong friendships that we make.