San Antonio Regional

[jwillis35]

Disagree with your assessment on Crown's brass music/arrangements. Getting 80 - 84 brass players to play the type of rhythmic passages and fast runs that they are playing (Most often spread across many yards) together is incredibly demanding. They have done this better than pretty much everyone else. For the individual player/part most drum corps music is not incredibly hard. In drum corps the challenging part is getting everything in unison while moving. That is the hard part. Just my opinion.

If you read carefully, never did I say Crown didn't do those things you just stated. I simply said that it's no more demanding than what other music calls for, and sometimes it's less demanding. Yes, the technical challenge of playing together is one of the difficult aspects facing most drum corps, and Crown does a fantastic job. Don't think for a minute that I don't love the Crown sound or their music. I love it.

[ShouldveMarchedAgeOut]

wow, I'm rewatching San Antonio On demand and the Cascades have a super solid show. If only they had more numbers in their hornline. really impressed

[seen-it-all]

If you read carefully, never did I say Crown didn't do those things you just stated. I simply said that it's no more demanding than what other music calls for, and sometimes it's less demanding. Yes, the technical challenge of playing together is one of the difficult aspects facing most drum corps, and Crown does a fantastic job. Don't think for a minute that I don't love the Crown sound or their music. I love it.

That's why I loved Blue Devils hornline last year and all the harmonic challenges they had in that Rite of Spring show. And the Cadets hornline for playing some arrangements written in some very challenging keys. Crown's hornline is magnificent, there is no doubt. But demand isn't just limited to quantity of notes or complex rhythmic passages. You can take any of the top hornlines and find tremendous challenges everywhere. And I love how all three of those hornlines are distinctly pretty different from one another. All great.

[audsquad]

A 'Thank You' to all those who have posted on this thread. Reading through it -- which took parts of 3 or 4 days! -- has added to my understanding of and appreciation for drum corps.

I posted a review of this (San Antonio Regional) show in the "Reviews" forum, as I think this thread is reaching its end....

Thanks again!

Edited July 22, 2014 by audsquad

[Bannedforlife]

Gene Pokorny is a 'terrible musician?' Yikes!

PostPosted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 6:40 pm Post subject: Reply with quote

Gene Pokorny said:

"When I was in high school in the early 1970's, I was taught a very important concept of balance from Benton Minor in California. The pyramid concept basically says that the highest voices in any ensemble should be supported slightly stronger and at least as reliably (in tune, rhythmically accurate, etc) by the immediate voices below. Those voices should be supported slightly stronger and more reliably yet by the voices below them, etc, until you reach the bottom voices which are the strongest and most reliable. This does not mean that the tuba players should be playing loud all the time."

Pokorny clearly does not have an unreasonable assertion of how to effectively use the pyramid of sound. I'm talking about band directors that use it as a way to cover up intonation issues and mask issues rather than fix them. This is a disservice to students that GUESS WHAT, are NOT Gene Pokorny, one of the most ###### tuba players the world has ever known from CSO's world famous brass section. I really hope you can discern between professional musicians that use the pyramid as a situationally dependent guideline rather than band directors that use it as a blanket concept to cover up ensemble issues rather than fix them so the administrators give their program more money. Trust me, my college band director always went back to the pyramid when he heard people with ALREADY crappy tone quality sticking out (students in his trumpet studio that he worked with every week! No excuse!) As I've stated before, the pyramid should be a general guideline, not a smoke and mirrors trick to cover up bad sounds.

[Bannedforlife]

I have to chime in here... to make a comparison.

I'm a music educator, though admittedly not in band. I have done a lot of vocal, choral, elementary pop/rock band performing and teahcing, as well as arranging and composing. I know a good blend and balance when I hear it. I also know good voice leading when I hear it.

I can relate to this overuse of the pyramid methaphor for blending/balancing the brass. Untrained singers often say, "grab the third" when putting harmonies together... as if the 'third' magically stayed one chord tone above a melody composed purely of tonic scale tones throughout. I want to laugh - or punch them. Chord tones of course weave around and good voice leading means dressing up the melody in a way that makes the most sense when considering instrumentation, texture, etc. Certain scale tones should not be doubled or even emphasized - like thirds. So if you had, say, a third in the tubas or euphs, a 'pyramid' model would sound out of balance - and downright awful if the mellos or trumpets were also playing one. A good composer/arranger would never double a third like that though.

Theory 101.

THANK YOU! These are all perfect examples of why the pyramid is only effective (or lack therof) on a case by case basis.

[mjyaub]

http://i.imgur.com/BxFLLPb.jpg

[jkingqm]

It's unfortunate when a missing member means a missing prop.

Thanks for the explanation. I saw in VOD the pillow prop in the sideline. Got in this threat to find comments!