Tekneek

Not because they choose to audition. It would be because they are actually marching with them. There is a competitive and financial advantage gained from being able to replenish your ranks with veterans from other corps. I personally know people who ended up marching with top corps, such as Cadets, Cavaliers, etc, who would not have been able to get in there without the seasoning they received at another corps. Those corps received a benefit from the other corps, perhaps while they were arguing that those lower corps should get less money and even be bumped from performing at the same show with them. I'd like to see them give something back for effectively being a feeder corps.

I think the big corps (G7, for instance) should pay something to the lower-ranked corps when they get veterans from them each year. Sort of a training fee.

It does have SSL encryption. :) Formstack is a known provider, but what you don't know for sure is who owns that form that you're being sent to. Why they chose a third party for it is way beyond me. I don't believe this is a phishing attempt, but I wouldn't laugh at anybody for suspecting it.

The Star of Indiana model is a self-sufficient concept. Bill Cook started several companies and had the non-profit entity own them, so the profits went to them. He had business know-how and the connections to get the right people in the right places. Not every person trying to do this is going to be as successful. It's unfortunate that there isn't another wealthy person out there who cares about the marching arts enough to finance the whole operation. I think the model Bill Cook followed with Star would be a good model for any non-profit operation though. Rather than your goal being to fund raise and seek donations each year, run some profitable businesses that can help sustain your operations. The Star of Indiana website had some really good pages that went into his philosophy about how to start and run a drum corps. Unfortunately, the site appears to be gone now.

I think it is possible, but you will have to be sure you're alright with what you're going to be doing. You're effectively going to be trying to teach kids to play the instruments each year and instill them with a love of the activity. You're probably going to end up measuring success by how many kids move onto bigger corps and keeping your financials in order. There have been people that were ok with doing this for a few years, but something seems to go off the rails after that.

Whether mandatory or not, it is effectively mandatory (just as we knew it would be). I strongly suspect a corps not making use of these will be told by judges to consider it and will lose competitively by refusing to do so.

This is sort of a threadjack, but is specifically related to some points made in this thread. Further discussion of these points would be better made in a different post altogether. I don't think the G7 is assassinating drum corps in the middle of the night, but I think they have certainly created an environment that is not conducive to growing the number of corps actively competing. They are a self-serving bunch that are primarily interested in consolidating their domination of the activity, rather than increasing the competition.

Indeed. While each corps has their own reasons for folding up, some of which they may never want to make public, the wording of the announcement makes it sound like there is something to be learned and something that could be changed. Hopefully more information may come out.

It is easy to say you're going to do something about it. Giving back money is a good start. How they intend to fix it going forward is the really important part. They could go a long way by getting themselves onto set top boxes, like Roku, Apple TV, etc.

I saw the DCI Finals broadcast in 1988. I attended my first show in person in the summer of 1989. Drums Across America at Sprayberry High School. Southwind Crossmen Florida Wave Suncoast Sound Cadets of Bergen County Spirit of Atlanta

I think amplification of the pit in order to play with better technique, and not destroy the instrument, is a good idea. Balance issues should be punished on the sheets (not sure they are anymore), just as they would be without amplification. I have not enjoyed the contribution that amplified vocals, amplified horns, or electronics bring to the shows though. If anything, they tend to be a negative experience and take away from my enjoyment.

I bumped a judge in a show, somewhere on the east coast. He was suddenly in front of me for a split second when we started moving fast across the field.

I only marched with one corps, but I can say the presumption was that everyone was religious, even if you weren't hit over the head with it all the time. I didn't mind the few religious things that went on, because it was more of a ritual that we did and became part of the experience. Something like the horn line getting together and saying the Lord's Prayer before a performance is not a big deal (I'm agnostic at best and didn't mind). If by Christian, the drum corps wishes to express more fundamentalist/political views, I would say that would be a pretty bad idea and best to not touch regardless of what the believers amongst them think.

I think they already exist. All of the drum corps in the US are probably already Christian drum corps.

Given that the vast majority of visitors to dci.org on Thursday/Friday/Saturday are looking for scores, a simple score page should come up first with an option to continue to any other hot pages (live blog/streaming/etc) or through to the normal dci.org site. This is simple stuff.

From what I have seen of anything he has written, from rule proposals to blog posts and other social media, I'd say his written communication leaves a lot to be desired. There is certainly a conflict between the written word of George Hopkins and what many claim he says/does when you're actually face to face with him.

I would pay up to maybe $25, if I could be certain that it would work properly for the duration. If there are likely to be technical issues/disruptions/difficulties, I'd pay around $10.

So nothing has been blacked out due to uncleared samples from electronics? I had been told otherwise. If that has not been the case, then I take that back. I had been told from people still on the inside of the activity that this was a problem generated by electronics.

I suppose there have always been some issues with these things, such as times when soloists ended up louder/quiter in the recording mix than they were live, or pit instruments ended up being louder because a microphone was near them and the recording was quite a bit different than the live presentation. Everyone needs to remember that these are not studio recordings. When we played for the Ornaments in Brass CD recording, we were in a studio and the recording sounded quite a bit different than the levels you heard from the field recording (as I recall).

If there was a decibel maximum for the amplification, perhaps they could work with that from an audio engineering perspective. I'm not aware that there is a decibel maximum is there? That should really have been put into the rules before that box was opened.

Let's keep this in mind. All that talk about Stravisnky was about him, not about the performers who played it. When we talk bad about a show on the field, it isn't about the performers. It's about the show itself. Those people who get all bent about us saying something bad about the kids need to learn to separate criticism about the product away from criticism about the performers. Even the best performers in the world can't rescue an unappealing product, and we all get to accept that. Sometimes, looking back, we can see it in a different light and appreciate it more, but that doesn't mean we will appreciate it when it is happening. Just like Star of Indiana's 1993 show was an abomination to a lot of people at the time, but now I believe it is seen with an entirely different perspective. This is ok. It is the way things work. We get to accept it because it is reality.

Great points about engaging your audience. Given that DCI involves a stadium tour and all the while is trying to move merchandise along the way (as well as having an archive of material to sell for years/decades), anything that reduces the perceived value of the tickets to events and the merchandise is a negative. If you make an art film that is only going to appeal to die-hard film geeks and your immediate friends/family, you're going to have to really reduce that budget or expect to take a big loss, and parading it around like it is the best thing to happen to movies is probably going to get you laughed at. Saying that current teenagers in marching band think it is great is hardly an impartial crowd. They are going to gravitate towards whatever is available. It is an extension of what they do already. People, especially kids, will tend to rave about whatever is perceived as the top echelon of whatever activity they are involved with (be it sports, music, film, whatever). That alone is hardly an indicator that all is well and the path is a good one. If you just want to do an art piece, you could save a lot of money by just filming it and releasing it yourself via on-demand DVD/CD production and downloads. If you want to tour it and play it in big stadiums, you might want to work in something that will grab your audience and make them feel like it was at least worth the price of admission. If you know the goal is to have all of these packaged into CDs and DVDs for future generations to be able to buy and watch, you should also have all of your copyrights in order ahead of time. Imagine if you bought movies where portions were blacked out because they didn't have permission to include that part in the home DVD. That would be ridiculous, but people in this activity seem to be ok with intentionally devaluing the merchandise and exposure.

If only I had the financial means...I could march a bunch of props and just let the synth play the entire show.

And it has caused real harm to the audio/video history of the activity through portions, or entire shows, being blacked out (obviously referring to the use of electronics with this). I think it is very hard, maybe impossible, to find the positives and very easy to find the negatives. That has been a net loss to the activity and DCI. It is rare that I find anybody saying that the narration actually positively added to a show either, instead most people (even newbies) find it distracting/annoying.

It only sounds silly if you want it to be a free for all. At that point, might as well not have any scores either.