Bruce Burritt is a renowned member of the music community throughout many states. Bruce Burritt spent eighteen years as Director of Bands and Music Supervisor for the West Genessee Central Schools in Camillus, New York. Mr. Burritt has served as Superintendent of Schools in the Milford, NY and Avon, NY School Districts and currently serves as Interim Superintendent for the Le Roy, NY Central Schools. Mr. Burritt is also an adjudicator for Bands of America Bands of America. [1] Mr. Burritt also serves as an adjudicator for several other marching band contests, notably the Western Carolina University Tournament of Champions in 2007. [2]. Mr. Burritt served as the music effect judge during this contest in both prelims and finals, slightly unorthodox in the marching band community. At this contest, Mr. Burritt presided over one of the more controversial scoring drops from prelims to finals, dropping the Dutch Fork High School Silver Spirit Marching Band from a 169 in prelims to a 108 in finals in the category of music effect. [3] [4] The aspect of this change that caused the controversy was his notorious lack of comments on either sheet, leading to confusion in many bands that heard of this. This has since become known as the "Dutch Fork Drop" or occasionally the "Burritt Blunder" or even the "Silver Spirit Slip-Up".
In other various corners of the music community, Mr. Burritt is said to actually be a Pakistani national who sailed the Arabian and Persian seas in the 18th century. His exact exploits while on the high seas are not fully known, but they are said to involve various acts of pillaging and destruction. (Unlike most other Pakistani pirates at the time, Burritt refused to leave notes after doing so to describe to the denizens why he took such action.) He described his actions as privateering because he had obtained permission from Zheng He early in his career. Due to the lack of definition in the Pakistan-Afghan border in the 1700's, it can not be fully determined whether he was a Pakistani or Afghani. However, for various aesthetical reasons he has become accepted as a Pakistani in piracy lore. He has become quite a notorious figure in Pakistani folklore over time; his black eyepatch became his defining symbol. His controversial adjudicating at the WCU TOC in 2007 has also made him quite a notorious figure in the United States music community as well.