Verona kids are fine tuning their instruments and getting ready to take on township police in the third annual Cops & Rockers battle of the bands.

This year's show will be held at on Saturday, May 18, at the Verona High School Auditorium, 151 Fairview Ave. Tickets will cost $10 at the door. Doors open at 5 p.m. and the performance starts at 6 p.m.

The show was originally scheduled for Saturday Feb. 9, but was rescheduled following a snowstorm.

“We wanted to give local kids a chance to show off their talents at a battle of the bands and give them the ultimate rock star experience,” said Cops & Rockers Sgt. Dan Greco who founded the event in 2011 with the help of the Verona PBA Local #72.

“The Verona kids put on an amazing show for our first annual Cops & Rockers show and they rocked 2012 as well,” he said.

Both events have brought in a total of $10,000 and police are hopeful that this year will bring in even more, they said.

Proceeds from the events go to the Verona Music Program and the PBA Scholarship Fund. This year's donations will also go to victims of Hurricane Sandy, said Greco.

The bands will perform an original song as well as popular cover songs to compete for a grand prize. The winner will be decided though a live text vote, which will be displayed at the end of the show.

This year's grand prize is an original song by the winning band professionally recorded by Cat Eyez recording Studio in Verona as well as a professionally shot music video featuring the band.

Rocktec Music of Verona not only provided a stage, instruments, fog machine and a public address system, but will also be donating two Dean Guitars to be raffled off for the audience,” said Greco.

“The past shows were professionally recorded and were mixed by Bob Agosto of Cat Eyez Studios, who has also synced up the produced audio with a three camera video shoot of the performance,” said Greco. “Even the kids who didn’t win the grand prize had an incredible memory captured on CD and DVD.”

Sponsors and partners include:

• Verona PBA Local #72
• Rocktec Music of Verona
• Cat Eyez Studios
• Legendery Entertainment
• The Verona Music Parent Association
• MyVeronaNJ.com

Click here to visit the Cops and Rockers page on Facebook.