tulsaslide

"I will concede that one aspect of blue devils design is that breaks between movements are somewhat rare and only happen once or twice so they all sort of blend together and they generally don't leave room for clapping. Even in California the brass stabs between the end of Laura and the trumpet solo were met with silence in 2010, but that doesn't mean the Laura balled sucked or made no sense or wasn't entertaining, it just wasn't a "resolving chooooord, band horns down, woooooo!" moment where everyone knew and felt that here is when you clap. That usually doesn't happen in BD shows like it would in, say, Crown or Cadets shows. To me, that doesn't mean they're not entertaining. And I would say one would be backing themselves into a very narrow corner to define entertainment (objectively) by resolving chords and opportunities to go nuts, or crowd reaction for that matter (subjectively there's so much more)." Just speaking to the 2010 show, I have to remark that I'm certainly a Blue Devils fan (and more so a DCI fan in general--we had Phantom's 1989 New World arrangement played by a brass group at my father's funeral last year). Here's the thing: during the 2010 show in Sioux Falls where I live, the Blue Devils got more gasps than I ever heard around me at a live show, even more than I remember watching Star Of Indiana in Jackson at the 1993 finals. It was even different from the visceral response I remember clearly from seeing Santa Clara in 1989. To my surprise, my mother, who is a devout Norwegian Lutheran and doesn't care much for jazz (she dismissed the 1991 BD show I loved so much at the time as "I'm going to need more major chords" when we saw them together at a couple shows in Minnesota that summer) said she can't remember seeing a corps perform that well. And at several points it was just gasps from the audience, more of a "How did they do that?" response rather than some sort of automatic applause moment. Different strokes for different folks, I guess, but I remember those gasps much more clearly than any of the applause moments of any shows I saw that summer... At some point, performance excellence is an important thing. Especially for judges, of course, but even for some of the crowd. Maybe they need to yell louder or tweet something about throwing babies, but their responses to the show are part of the equation too.

No, you wouldn't . You dislike the Blue Devils for a different reason. The Blue Devils do arrange things to the hilt, but I can only think of two things in the last three years that were more or less ripped from the original: Carolina Crown's treatment in the middle of the show of "Fanfare For The Common Man." By the way, I've noticed no negative commentary from you about their appropriation of those themes to create song transitions or anything else. The other: Blue Devils' treatment of Stan Kenton's version of "Laura." Longest ballad I've ever heard in DCI history, and thrilling musically all the way (to me, admittedly. I don't presume to speak for anybody else). The Boston Crusaders' "Pines of the Appian Way" preshow cut more corners than that arrangement. The Phantom Regiment's arrangement of "Turandot" cut more corners. That leads me to believe you simply dislike the Blue Devils for a different reason. Let's take a look at your actual words and the Blue Devils repertoire over the last four years. You need a doctorate to understand music that was (mostly) copyrighted and debuted in 1930? Surely you don't need a doctorate to honestly dislike the controversial big band arrangements of Bob Graettinger, and the Stan Kenton originals are available in so many online formats that you can't seriously claim that the 2010 Blue Devils chopped and bopped their arrangements (the four minutes of "Laura" and the adventurism of "Incident In Jazz" are enough, even if you ignore how clever and difficult the closing material is). The version of that 2010 show I saw live was the cleanest and most astonishing drum corps show I've ever seen. As for 2011, where they DID in fact chop-and-bop pop songs (much more so after the initial June/early July poundings from judges), where was the commentary about melodic lines? That was the one year where stupid vocals covered up the music at times (unless you're going back to 2005, in which case I have lots of comments about the 2002-2008 seasons). 2012 was disjointed by design, and it certainly grew with each listening and watching for me Again, I don't presume to speak for anybody else. And, they had a chunk of tunes they didn't "chop and bop" at all. I can understand the disagreement with recent show designs but I don't understand the contempt for the recent show designs (unless you need a doctorate in criticism to understand that)....

"(I prefer that drum corps use drums and brass to create emotion rather than recorded music or quotes)" To the OP: it's really okay to listen to Blue Devils' drums and brass while they perform their show. They did some utterly fantastic work this year...

Kathy, I think you're thinking of Blue Devils '91. The opener was mostly from "Commencement" from Stan Kenton's Adventures In Time and it's one of my favorites too--

Long-time reader, first-time poster. I live in Sioux Falls and enjoyed the show very much tonight. A quick review: Troopers The opening sequence was very effective: drum break building out of the Barber Souvenirs material, a trademark sunburst in the drill, and then a good "wow" opening statement. Part of this was because they were the first World Class corps of the night and the conditions were perfect for drum corps. Seventies, almost no wind at field level, and clear blue skies that seemed to stretch to eternity and back.; so every big hit sounded CD-quality in the stadium. Anyway, they sounded to me like they have potential top-12 talent in the horn line. The Copland music that makes up much of the show is angular and acerbic, and I heard more than one audience member ask their neighbors (in a well-intentioned manner) if they thought the show was a bit "light on melody." The brass book and drum book are well done, and the performers were outstanding. To my inexpert eye, the guard could certainly contribute more to the show. I had chats in the concourse with a couple of local high-school-age volunteers that said they were definitely going to try to make the Troopers next year. Isn't that fun? I'm happy that "making the Troopers" is such a laudable goal again-- Glassmen I think this program was well-constructed. I enjoyed it a lot, and I didn't expect to. The brass book surprised me, in a good way. The Glassmen don't have quite as much power as the corps that followed them (and struggled at times to match the standard that the Troopers had set), but they played cleanly, and the programming and pace made a lot of sense to me. The corps seems to have all the individual elements there for a Finals return, but there are also gaps. The visual book seemed to miss a bit; they'll need to perform it better to make their way up the leaderboard (Blue Stars and Madison, for instance, had lots of demand that wasn't being executed yet, but you could see the room for improvement in effect and score). It's great fun to hear the Saint-Saens Organ Symphony again, and their treatment of it is very reverential. I'm so glad Glassmen made it through South Dakota this year; again, I'm usually a bit of a skeptic about their design and style. But seeing them in person was a treat. Make no mistake--this is a talented corps. Blue Stars My goodness, Myron Rosander has written a very difficult drill! Exciting to watch even the attempt, but it's going to take a lot of work to pull it off. This corps is somewhat local, and several Sioux Falls-area students march in the corps, so I'm delighted that they've made such a resurgence, and I generally think that the DCI activity benefits from having these unique voices like Frank Sullivan contributing to the product. The Blue World show is good, but I didn't love it. The corps is attracting a much higher caliber of brass player these last few years, so they sound big and important. There's probably enough demand in the show, but to keep up with Madison and Spirit of Atlanta they'll need more design tricks and more clarity. I have a feeling (based on the fact it's June and there was a stage set up that got conspicuously little use) that there are some clever improvements in store over the coming weeks. But that's almost always a given... The ballad sounded terrific tonight. The corps clearly has Finals-level talent. I think by cleaning up drill, by itself, we'll get a much better picture of how strong the show stands up to others in the 9-16 range. Spirit Of Atlanta What a pleasant surprise! The Sin City show design is smart and well-executed. They had the crowd in the palm of their hand--I might have to disagree with SDBassCreature and give them the slight nod for crowd favorites over Madison (just the fact that it was close is telling). I really liked the design choices, even though I wasn't wild about the musical repertoire, so kudos to the design staff. A Vegas-themed show seems like an automatic hit until you actually sit down and plan the details. This show connects with the crowd and, although it's easier to perform cleanly at this point, there's probably enough there to keep up the great early-season scores. It reminds me a bit of Phantom Regiment's 2012 show--it turns out audiences don't mind an easier show being performed to the hilt and creating an emotional connection with the audience. Audiences don't mind that at all-- Spirit Of Atlanta played the encore, and I enjoyed "Salvation Is Created" and "Georgia On My Mind." What fun. Congrats to the corps on a fantastic performance. I'm so glad they made it to South Dakota this year... Madison Scouts I had a nice chat with the women manning the merchandise trailer for Madison, and the first thing we talked about was how excited we were to see Spirit's show (based on the good things we had heard about it). The next thing we talked about was how this year's Madison Scouts show fuses some insider corps history and tradition with the repertoire (Pictures at an Exhibition). Malaga and Malaguena cleverly make their appearance (with a Great Gate of Kiev countermelody, blue notes and all), the corps sings the Promenade theme at one point, and it's generally a great time. Here's the thing: from my vantage point, the show didn't really land with the audience (due to the standard Spirit Of Atlanta had just set) until the ending, where they do the full on 50-yard-line pinwheel developing to a company front while playing some of the Great Gate of Kiev material. Huge applause from the crowd, and just genuine adrenaline. Bravo for having the courage to choose something so simple and satisfying to make that last push. The corps has tons of talent. The guard book seemed incomplete, or unsatisfying. The brass sounded really good. Not great, but really, really good. As for the placements and scores, they seem all right to me. I understand there was a bit of irregularity to the judges' duties based on a missing judge (?), and it wouldn't have surprised me to see Spirit eke out a narrow win tonight, but the scores seemed fair. In fact, my date (a Wisconsin native) pegged Spirit as the leader in the clubhouse. Again, all the performers were outstanding. I honestly didn't think I would enjoy this night as much as I did--