[lastknight]

After 32 years in and around this activity there are certain "moments" that just lodge themselves in your brain....your heart....your soul. They become a part of you.

Some of mine....

Guardsmen '79...first "real corps" I ever saw in the first show I marched in. They did the three count turn into the push of Greensleeves and I was amazed and awed and knew for the first time how bad my corps was (another discussion for another day). But how I wanted to stand in front of that wall of sound again and again and again.

Blue Devils '81...saw them live (warming up @ Disneyland, no less) for the first time and suddenly realized how "bad" recorded drum corps was (then).

Madison Alumni Corps 2006...made me wanna go buy a bari and a gym membership



Skipping ahead, what is it with Bluecoats? I always loved the OLD arrangement of Autumn Leaves (I think it was modeled after an arrangement on an old Stan Mark record). Here of late I like their shows OK, but they do seem to have a knack for finding and bringing to the field "that moment". In '08 it was "The Boxer". It still wakes me up in the middle of the night (normal people hear voices, I hear music, usually brass). In '11 it was Creep (and honestly, no offense, Radiohead doesn't appeal to me). I bet I've listened to that 2-3 minutes 40 times in the last couple days. How do they manage to make a moment that .....?

If anybody could come up with 11 mintes of that they could rule the world.

This post has been edited by lastknight: 02 December 2011 - 11:55 AM

[G-Rott]

1989 Santa Clara...the final push of the show...no matter how loud it got, it kept getting louder...still brings tears to my eyes even just from the DVD...

Also Santa Clara 1992...the Bottle Dance...chills and more chills...

Announcement of the scores at the 2008 finals...the biggest spontaneous crowd reaction I have ever had the experience of being part of...

Watching my daughter perform in the guard with LVK and Jersey Surf...

and...fulfilling my dream of being part of the rifle line with the Reading Buccaneers..

those are the moments that re-play in my mind...

[perc2100]

lastknight, on 02 December 2011 - 11:53 AM, said:

Skipping ahead, what is it with Bluecoats? I always loved the OLD arrangement of Autumn Leaves (I think it was modeled after an arrangement on an old Stan Mark record). Here of late I like their shows OK, but they do seem to have a knack for finding and bringing to the field "that moment". In '08 it was "The Boxer". It still wakes me up in the middle of the night (normal people hear voices, I hear music, usually brass). In '11 it was Creep (and honestly, no offense, Radiohead doesn't appeal to me). I bet I've listened to that 2-3 minutes 40 times in the last couple days. How do they manage to make a moment that .....?

If anybody could come up with 11 mintes of that they could rule the world.

Yeah, that's the real trick huh. IMO Bluecoats had an incredible opening 'moment' with Creep, and then the rest of their show could never come close to that...beauty (I honestly don't know how I would characterize their opening statement with Creep: cool? beautiful? majestic? elegance?). Same with Cavaliers last year. I LOVED their show, and I totally get the ebb/flow of their production and why things happened the way they did. But I feel like they had the coolest part of their show in the middle, and the last third never really hit the way the first 2/3's did.
That's why, I think, when a truly great show design from top-bottom clicks, it's something special: it's incredibly hard, if not almost impossible, to design a show that hits all the right moments at the right times to maximize everything. Bluecoats 2011 had a great beginning, but couldn't sustain that effect past Creep. Cavaliers had it with the upside down playing but couldn't put together a closer that matched/topped it. Even Cadets had some cool stuff in their show, but I don't think anything in their show really hit me the way other moments did: they didn't have a bad show, and I really liked what they did, but I never felt "that" like I did with other cool moments in shows.

[Jeff Ream]

Oh God...so many...



in no order:

Phantom 08 the last 3 minutes

Phantom 96....from note one, you felt something special happening

SCV 87...RCM

Cadets 87...company front to the end

Crossmen 92.....drum solo to the end of Puma/Rainforest

Boston 00 the ballad and again leading up to the Conquest hits

BD 94...in July....wow

Cadets 83....amazing

SCV09...the push

Madison 99....end of drum solo thru brass re-entry

SCV 92 with the Bottle Dance

VK 92 with the Shark


I know I am missing others

[corpsband]

lastknight, on 02 December 2011 - 11:53 AM, said:

In '11 it was Creep (and honestly, no offense, Radiohead doesn't appeal to me). I bet I've listened to that 2-3 minutes 40 times in the last couple days. How do they manage to make a moment that .....?

If anybody could come up with 11 mintes of that they could rule the world.

Loved - loved - loved Creep. Not only musically -- visually it was very good *modern* drum corps.

[glory]

Phantom '03, the Canon reprise. All of a sudden, stars rained from heaven. The glory.

HH

[BD9]

2008 end of phantom. The long chord in 2000 scv's Adagio. Creep definitely.
Also for me personally was the ballad of 09 Academy, first live show I had ever seen. It was amazing.
Boston 2000s ballad. Madison's closer this year. BDs WAMLAW, also 2005 in the final (first?) push of the show, with the narrator's "dancers, are you ready? Audience, are you ready?", basically that whole section.

[TeddyBear]

SCV 2009's company front. The first time I was part of a standing ovation at least a minute before the show ended. The moment that made me go, "Oh man, now I HAVE to buy the CDs and DVDs."

[DrillmanSop06]

If a show were 11 minutes of moments, those moments wouldn't be nearly as special. Often, it's the contrast that makes them extraordinary. Designers don't program 11 minutes of fire; the trick is allow for that ebb and flow, that contrast. A beautiful moment must be set up correctly. Bluecoats 2008 is a prime example.

[MarchandPlay]

Santa Clara Vanguard 1999

That entire show just keeps progressing, and never gets boring to me. I can listen to that show on repeat for the rest of my life and never get bored of it. Honestly. Not a dull moment in that show, and it has many "moments" on top of it.