Timing Hornlines

[noahsigs]

Y'all have been asking for this for quite some time now... So here it is. I decided to sit down with a stop watch and watch every show available, so you savages better be satisfied. I counted sections and small ensembles(more than 4 players), but not solos. (I put in a mini-review and description of timing thingys, because I own you.) All of these shows may be off by ~10 seconds because I am a people, and people are not always perfect. Hope I don't get in trouble for baiting the dinosaurs.

Crossmen: 5:07 Sorry Bones. Love you guys, but you just didn't play that much. That's kind of what you expect from an entirely original composition though. Or maybe you don't. I'm 17. I have a friend in the pit though... So good for him!

Blue Knights: 5:35 Pretty disjointed, lots and lots of small ensemble playing. I'm 90% sure if I didn't count small ensembles they would not have broken the 5 minute mark. Disappointing, tbh.

Blue Stars: 5:41 Fairly well paced. Played for the ENTIRE ballad, which was cool. Audio cut out at one point but it was pretty clear that they were playing the whole time.

Bluecoats: 5:57 Mmm... tasty show. I had to count the bunch of trombones playing in the beginning of the ballad, and only counted the octed when they were all playing, as is the law.

The Cavaliers: 6:08... I think. I already did this one and I'm too lazy to look it up. If someone else is not, I will edit and owe you 11.5 minutes. (Or is it 15 Minutes? :D)

Phantom Regiment: 6:15 Although beautiful at times, this show continues to astound me with how remarkably average a show can be. Keep up the work, Phantom. (ugh, i miss when j.p. morgan was there...)

Blue Devils: 6:17 Very not choppy, surprisingly. Long stretches of playing as a full ensemble, and then no playing at all(full percussion/dubstep features). Sometimes hard to tell if the whole hornline was playing during the ballad. Really enjoy this show.

The Academy: 6:28 My God what a fun show. Very well constructed. I think. (And yes, I counted the "bum"s individually in the beginning of Sorcerer's Apprentice. I enjoyed that a little too much.)

The Cadets: 6:31 I genuinely enjoy this show, especially Turning. My favorite part is Turning it Off. (just kidding i actually love turning it's so EDGY and brooding,,, like my teenage soul.......)

Santa Clara Vanguard: 6:53 I had to start this one over a couple times, and I didn't mind in the slightest. idk if these guys are the clowns they're talking about in their corps song, but if they are... they're definitely the Class Clowns™.

Madison Scouts: 6:56 You guys do quite a bit of playing! Now, a lot of it is individual sections playing strings of melody made unnecessarily difficult in order to score points, disrupting the musical flow of the piece... But I'm obsessed with Jesus Christ Superstar so you get a thumbs up from me. (just one. i have two)

Carolina Crown: 8:01 Haha wow. Knew they featured their brass but this is just great. Not even any questionable moments... The only time that there was just one section was the tuba transitions, and it's not super easy stuff. Really are Relentless.

This was horrible and this also means nothing. (but please share your thoughts on this nothing so i feel validated)

(P.S. I only edited this because it screwed up my formatting. I'm watching you mods.)

Edited July 30, 2016 by noahsigs

[UKSuperman]

I had a feeling Crown played the most. Yeah, it's broken up by short bits of Percussion, but like I've said before, they have to shine through sometimes too!

[Lance]

jeremy is right.

the stopwatch thing is idiotic to me, but obviously important and interesting to a lot of others. my apologies.

Edited July 30, 2016 by Lance

[Jeremy.]

Lance is an angry person... Thanks OP for this! Interesting for sure! 👍👍👍👍

[Lance]

crown's hornline is particularly glorious this year, and they're always glorious.

scv's brass sound is the best i've heard from them in over a decade.

great year pretty much top to bottom for anybody who loves the beauty of brass ensembles. extraordinary really.

[jwillis35]

I don't mind seeing timings, but I caution folks to not stereotype length of time for any one section as a means of deciding quality, or perhaps a "this is how it should be" kind of thing. In a roughly 12 minute show what if we look at it like this:

• brass - 6 min total not including solos
• battery percussion - 3 minutes when not featured with brass
• pit - 3 min when not featured with battery or brass

If we viewed the above as a model it can make sense. Some corps will want to feature battery without brass, and also feature pit without battery and brass. Allowing 3 minutes for pit and battery on their own can help to create a better balance to the arranging and orchestrating -- perhaps to the entire flow of the show. Whatever creates the best musical landscape -- the best total arrangement of melody, counter-melody, rhythm, color, and harmony in a musical sense spread over all the voices -- should be the goal, not a specific time for brass only.

Another way we could view this, if one so wished, is this: It's called DRUM & BUGLE CORPS...

• so why not feature the drums (battery) for 6 minutes on their own
• then brass for 4 on their own
• and pit for 2 on their own
• Why should brass be given some advantage over percussion?

Of course, we know it's not. In reality, the brass and percussion spend a lot of time playing together. They sometimes trade off on things (with pit in the mix), and then they are featured for periods of time. Ultimately, what works best in terms of creating a total show and musical landscape is the goal, not a fixed number.

• what a section plays and how well they play it is more important than how LONG they play.
• Quality vs. Quantity.

As in the case of Carolina Crown I think we can all agree they have a special brass line and feature them well. That is their strength and it works for them in both design of the show and the construction of their music book. But it's not what I would recommend for all corps. Typically with a corps like Blue Devils or Cadets over the many years, both groups have had many stellar brass lines, drums, pit, solos, and a good mix was extremely important to their designs. As with the Bluecoats this year I think they have found a perfect mix of those elements for their show. And when their brass are playing they are digging into some incredible music.

Edited July 30, 2016 by jwillis35

[Mello Dude]

The activity is about playing and marching. Obviously, if you play and march more you have a LOT more to clean. Not to contradict the previous post but it is important how much and little people play in regards to a judged competition. It would be interesting to see how much the difference is to say corps 10 or 20 years ago in this regard. It might also point to huge glaring issues at why some people percieve a lack of musical thought to some music corps are playing. Sacrificing music quality to visual etc type stuff. The fact the spread is so big is surprising.

[cfirwin3]

The implication in this discussion has historically been that extending the texture or impact of section X somehow equals a better score or substantiates the claim that corps Z is being ripped off while corps Y is skating along without doing any work.

Obviously the problem with such an analysis is that it doesn't account for the presence of a designed, written and performed 'show' or 'program'... and it assumes that the redundant replication of skill is superior to mixed variety (perhaps as a demonstration of some kind of endurance?).

I don't know about you... but when I see a magic show... I want variety. When I see the guy in the silly, flashy outfit saw the lady in half, I assume he can do it again and again. I don't need to see it twice. It's time for contrast, like a close-up trick or an escape... and so the program goes.

Corps X hitting the rips, chords, arpeggios, and chorales for 4 minutes is certainly better than corps Y doing the same for 8 minutes if the SHOW of corps X is more satisfying than corps Y.

Of course... we already know this.

[garfield]

crown's hornline is particularly glorious this year, and they're always glorious.

scv's brass sound is the best i've heard from them in over a decade.

great year pretty much top to bottom for anybody who loves the beauty of brass ensembles. extraordinary really.

Really, really agree. And I'm a drum guy!

[Ghost]

10 seconds because I am a people,

Are you related to emc2? (Sorry, but I couldn't resist that comment. Time an NFL team some day and you'd be shocked to learn how little time they are actually playing (whistle to whistle.)