Tenoris4Jazz

It's on the sheet, but given some of the "marching" and visual performances I've seen over the past 10 years, it's obviously taking a huge back seat to the design. BD got perfect scores in visual in 2014 and I counted 5 missed forms in less than 2 minutes. Visual now is "That's a great design! Don't worry about all those bad lines and intervals and poor marching technique... what you're TRYING to do is really awesome!" Seriously... it's more participation trophy than actual critical assessment of what was really done.

########. A gack is a gack... that's not an opinion. Go listen to BD '89 and tell me that's an opinion. Dropping a rifle is a measurable fact. Screwing up an interval, not having a straight line, missing a rest, blowing an entry, phasing... all objective mistakes that can be judged objectively.

Bingo! Plus, Star's show in '93 was too much, too soon. It gave us a glimpse of the future, but it wasn't anything people wanted to see or hear in 1993. The audience shouldn't have any influence????? Then what the #### are they there for???? The audience response is why Phantom won the #### title in '08. Of COURSE there is going to be bias... we're human beings, it's part of who we are.

Oh good grief, I'm going to have to go there... From 1983 backwards, you were judged on your execution of your show 1st, the appeal to an audience 2nd, and the design 3rd. The point of the competition was... to perform well, score high, and have fun while accomplishing something, which might be a ring, a medal, and a flag. It was, above all else, A COMPETITION. Was that the best thing? Maybe not, but it worked for over 5 decades that way. Today, I don't see the point of scoring. Execution is all but abandoned, so what are they assigning scores to? Give 'em one score for the staff's design of a show, one score for doing it, and one score for whether the audience likes it or not. You only need three judges and they can use whole numbers... problem solved.

Things actually overheard during Cadets' '16 show: "Why is the groom by himself on top of the wedding cake?" "Is he just going to stay up there the whole show?" "So, he plays a couple of times and stands there the rest of the show?" "Why is that guy just standing there doing bodybuilding poses?" "Is he not going to play, or twirl something? He's just going to pose the whole show?" "What happened to the color guard scaffolding up front?" "Did they rewrite the music AGAIN?!?" "If you have to explain it, you messed up the design." The actual story gotten hidden behind the constantly changing visual design and the two guys who got (literally) put on pedestals and left there.

We lost a show in FL to another band from GA who used fireworks at the end of their show, which were illegal in GA, but legal in FL. Their style copied the Bridgemen, including the raunchy outfits for the color guard. For years the people who marched that show still referred to losing to "the fireworks and hookers show."

See Cadets 2016

Does it have be groundbreaking? Can't they just wear something appropriate without having to rewrite the book?

Late July... 90's and 95% humidity... watching a fog of sweat bees just descend on the field and no one is supposed to wave or swat at them. Civil disobedience of the highest order!

Haven't seen the show, but I have a question: why make her do all that running et. al. right before a solo? In the "caveman" days of drum corps, soloists stepped out of formation and spent a few seconds prepping for a solo. If the choice is between nailing the solo and staying in formation, I'll take the clean solo every time. There shouldn't be a deduction for having a soloist take a few seconds to get ready for their feature.

I know what you meant here, and I will give you the Cincinnati Reds as a comparative. Reds fans have been sold anything but a competitive or fun team for a decade. The players simply get paid to keep playing baseball. You march where you can if what you want is the experience. Why do fans keep paying to see Reds games? They love baseball, win or lose. Some MM's want competition, some just want to learn from marching. There's room for both.

DCI won't exist long enough for anyone to get close to BD's streaks. However... Bucs have won 14 of the last 16 DCA titles and finished 2nd the other two years. In fact, the last time Reading finished lower than 4th was... 1997. That's 20th century folks!!! Of course, the last time BD finished lower than 5th was... 1974.

or to The Museum of Drum & Bugle Corps History

Look at the reactions of Spirit and SCV. Spirit went from being one of the worst offenders to being the leader in prevention and education. SCV... just turned a deaf ear and a blind eye and said "Speak to the hand"... about abuse, questionable hiring practices, financial management, hanging MM's out to dry... the list is long. They practically ASKED for all this spotlight and scrutiny with their horrible behavior.

Ask a Catholic priest about attacking a group for actions of a few. My pastor had to stop letting kids hug him for about 2 years because he felt someone was always looking for an excuse to start letting accusations fly.

########!!! If the "leadership" of this outfit took being a "leader" seriously and with all necessary care, the person in the cart and everyone else involved would have been at the bus station headed home before retreat started. That's a cop out.

and somehow, she'll blame the bug for breaking her heart.

I helped coach my son's 6th grade basketball teams this past year. The two primary coaches let a LOT of things slide during practices. Discipline was non-existant. The assistant coach's own 5 yo son would just wander through the court during practice. The kids just weren't taking things seriously at all... until I decided I had to start asserting myself as a coach. Once I called them out and explained, in absolutely no uncertain terms, what I expected of them during practice, things calmed down... a lot. A couple of players even told my son "Dude, your dad is scary!" There's no excuse for those kids' behavior and the blame lies 99% on the leadership. Kids (and anyone under 25 has a non-fully developed brain) will get away with, and try, whatever leaders allow them to. If you have to make an example and throw a 1st chair out of the group, then you do it. You only get one chance to establish a culture, and VMAPA/SCV has totally blown it. I don't see any way this ends other than the end of drum corps in Santa Clara. The current leadership won't do the right thing and quit and they have made it painfully obvious they have no clue how to run the organization. As a parent, there's no way in hell I would let anyone I know send their child to SCV as it stands. Edit: I asked my son last night about his recollection of this practice, and he can't remember the "scary" comments. He did, however, vividly recall several teammates saying they "loved" me being their coach. They appreciated that I cared about them and their experience, and that I felt passionately about them being able to get everything out of basketball they wanted, even if it meant getting yelled at a few times when they were screwing around. Leadership is a LOT like being a parent: you can't afford to be their friend if it interferes or hinders your ability to lead them, discipline them, and guide them to where they need to go.

How in Hades do they think they're going to grow and keep healthy natural grass up there???????

I can't be the only one that sees an incredible amount of hypocrisy here. The MM's can't swear in uniform or in the corps jacket, but the instructors, many of whom I would guess ARE SCV ALUMNI are allowed to instruct using "harsh language"???

The following statement has been used many times in the last 10+ years, but it bears repeating: "If all the people who only see the show once all respond with 'What the hell was that???' then you might have a problem." It's not the MM's or the parents or the judges who need to "get" the show concept. They all will because they'll see it a dozen or more times. It's the people paying $15 or $30 to see the show in July in East BumbleF who don't know when or if to clap. And for the record, I'll bet 99% of those people don't know what the #### "Exogenesis" is either.

You offer my kids Taylor Swift's entire library vs. Stairway to Heaven, they're LZ all the way!

Officially announced, but where are they posted? Interested minds want to know!

We just found out this week that UGA's two-time national champion quarterback has been in college since 2017 and hasn't finished a degree. All this time spent putting the emphasis on football and he couldn't manage enough classes to actually get a degree in 6 years! He got drafted and will have an NFL contract, but not every kid is that lucky. I had a good friend my freshman year in college that walked on with the basketball team and was good enough to earn a scholarship, but they wanted him to drop most of his classes and schedule around basketball practice. He wouldn't, because he knew the NBA was not in his future, but a college degree and a career would be.

Way off base here. The base runner is to keep games from going on and on. They are trying to make games shorter and more exciting to keep fan interest, not "so the umps and players can hurry up and get to the bar afterwards." Dumb statement. As for the shift ban... baseball was never meant to be played with a defensive shift. Personally, they waited too long to ban it. As for your "advice"... someone spends 16 years playing baseball and makes it to the show, and you suddenly want them to quit doing what got them there and do something they've never done? Ridiculous.