KNOX — As many high school and college students enjoy the relaxing and warm days of summer resting and spending time at the beach, one Knox High School graduate is spending her summer marching 10 to 12 hours a day in the hot sun honing her marching and color guard skills in hopes of a 2008 Drum Corp International World Championship.
Kayla Holdread, a 2006 Knox High School graduate and former Redskin Brigade band member, was selected to participate in the well-known drum and bugle corps The Colts from Dubuque, Iowa.

Drum and Bugle Corps is very similar to high school marching band without the woodwind section. The corps consists of only brass instruments, drums, and color guard. All drums corps have strict audition requirements and have a maximum number of members allowed. DCI (Drum Corps International) is the governing body of this activity and organizes events across the United States and Canada for drum corps from around the world. Members of these elite units practice numerous hours a day during the summer and travel the country living on charter buses and sleeping on gym floors as they move from state to state to compete.   In August, the nationally televised DCI World Championships will take place in Bloomington at the Indiana University (I. U.) stadium. The championship was scheduled to be the first-ever event held in the brand new Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, but construction delays have moved the championship to the I. U. campus. Only the top drum corps will advance to the finals and Kayla is hoping that the Colts will make the cut and she will have the chance to compete for a world championship.
Kayla recently performed close to home as the Colts competed at a DCI show hosted at Michigan City. Kayla’s former high school band director, Bryan Ames, and his wife Lisa, were in the audience to cheer her on. “It was so great to see a former student take the skills that she learned in the Knox band and use them to continue competing at this level. I was so proud of Kayla and thought she did an amazing job. There were nearly 40 kids in the color guard and Kayla stood out as one of the better performers. I really hope that I get to see her perform in the World Championship in August.”
The Colts competition show is titled “Night and Day” and features music by Bernstein, Rozsa, Porter, and Loyd Webber. As a member of the color guard, Kayla helps to create the “look” of the show by performing with large flags that depict both the sun and the moon.
Congratulations to Kayla on her accomplishments and for making Starke County proud!  We hope to see you marching on television in August at the championship contest.