They’re Prepared to Beat the Odds

The Kingsmen are staging a comeback, says their longtime director.

Three years ago the only remnant of the group that won the first world championship title for drum and bugle corps in 1972 was a weekly game of Bingo played in the Kingsmen’s Stanton facilities.

The present-day Kingsmen could never compete with the much larger organization of the past. But for the last two years, the Kingsmen have been rehearsing and performing on a small scale, once again striving to provide a paradigm for excellence.

Tom Float, a former member of the Kingsmen, said the revival began in 1996, when Float agreed to help director Richard Oliverio set up a new program. The two agreed they would start small, buy all new equipment and hire instructors who could recruit good musicians. “Things have been taking off at a super-fast clip. A few years ago, there was nothing,” Float said. Last year there were about 35 musicians performing with the Kingsmen drum line.

Before 1996, the Kingsmen music program had not operated since 1988. For eight years, only a dance team and weekly Bingo game kept the Kingsmen name alive.

By 1997, Oliverio had persuaded the Stanton City Council to increase the number of nights he could hold Bingo from one to three. On Tuesday, the council will vote on whether to grant Oliverio yet another night. The motion is expected to pass, over the objections of Councilman Brian Donahue, who said he doesn’t believe the Kingsmen offer the city’s youth enough.

Only recently, he said, did the group agree to change the name from the Anaheim to the Stanton Kingsmen.

Oliverio says he knows it’s time to give something back to the city. He says he intends to take his current performing group to Stanton events so people can appreciate the Kingsmen’s abilities.

In an effort to recruit more Stanton youths, Float has toured the local high schools, advertising the free Monday night practices.

Even if the council approves the fourth night of Bingo, the odds of Oliverio’s putting together a full 128-member drum and bugle corps appear long.

He must overcome a history burdened by an organization that has folded several times and had in-house fighting, prompting the resignation of one director and the removal of another.

The Kingsmen have moved from Anaheim to Fountain Valley to Santa Ana to Stanton, suffered financial difficulties and, toward the end of the 1980s, had only a small group touring locally.

Beyond that, marching bands have largely replaced drum and bugle corps as competitive, intense musical arenas, creating recruiting difficulties.

Despite the odds, many say they would like the Kingsmen to succeed. Those who marched with the Kingsmen, or simply remember their act, want their memories revived. “I’m still keeping the dream alive,” said Mike Ellerby, former Kingsmen and director of Drums Across America. “It was a wonderful thing.”

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Judy Silber can be reached at (714) 966-5988.