All time shows: The Cadets

[Fran Haring]

Favorites, in no particular order (other than #1) and off the top of my head after just waking up... LOL:

1984

1990

1971

2011

1995

1992

2014

And a few just outside the cut line.

 

 

 

Edited December 20, 2017 by Fran Haring

[dans]

9 hours ago, BRASSO said:

 Favorites from The Cadets ( DCI years ) Chronological order:

       1984......"West Side Story "

        1987...." Appalachian Spring "

        1989..... " ;Les  Miserables"

        1992...... " To Tame The Perilous Skies "

        1995........" American Quintet "

        2002........" An American Revival "

        2003....... " Our Favorite Things "

        2005.........." The Zone "

        2011.......... " Between Angels and Demons "

 Least Favorites :

       2004.......... " Living in the Past With Jethro Tull. "

       2006........... " Volume 2  When Volume 1 Was All That Was Needed. " 

       2007............." This I Can Not Believe " 

       2014.............."  The Promise Of Talking About Famous Americans "

       2016........... "  Somebody Was Stoned "

       2017............." The Faithful, The Fallen, the Fateful Choir "

     

     

I agree with your least favorites; however, 2007 Cadets was one hell of a drum corps. One of the best I have ever seen. If only they would have been given a better show.

[ThePlanets]

Okay here we go for favorites:

1. 2000 we are the future. Cadets and Cavies were the only corps I knew about in highschool  for a reason.  The music, visual, and execution of this show were top notch. Amazing show and one of the greatest of all time.

2. 1985- Jeremiah/Candide- my favorite show from the Cadets Bernstein trifecta by far. I love the music and the design seems far ahead of it's time. Besides- it's the show that won the year I was born.

3. 2010 Toy SOULdier- I know it finished 5th which is terrible for the cadets but O find this show to be very enjoyable, underrated, and endearing. My favorite modern cadets show.

4. 2011- Between Angels and Demons. Liked the red vs white uniforms.  I have to admit it probably would have been a lot more fun wearing a red uniform during this show. 

5. 1993- In the Spring, When Kings go off to war. Just a great unique show and the music fits the Cadets well. I haven't seen anything like it from the Cadets since.

HMs and conversation pieces-

1983- the original Bernstein Mass show.  I really appreciate this show and what it did for drum corps but I just can't get into it. Fantastic performance from the Cadets though.

1984- West Side Story- this show was a little more entertaining than Mass but I am still not really into West side story.

2007- ...This I Believe- I actually liked this show and thought it was tastefully done but it opened up one big can of worms.

2005- through a door. This was actually the first Cadets show I saw live and they were amazing! But another show I can't really get into.

2012- 12.25- it was really fun to watch perfectly conceived Christmas shapes from the nosebleeds at finals. Only Christmas show that tops it is SCV Russian Christmas music in 87

2016 Awakening- this gets an HM from me just for the bones in the Pines of Rome.

Least Favorites

2014 Promise: An American Portrait- Yes Lincoln Portrait is an important piece in music literature, and yes I still don't like it. Way too much narration and a stage that basically blocks a good view of the corps behind it.

2017 the faithful, the fallen, the forgiven. Too much theatre, too much singing, too much acting, not enough cadets playing their insturments...which they are really good at

2003- our favorite things- Malaguena was just too pretty.

Edited December 20, 2017 by ThePlanets

[Tad_MMA]

*cracks knuckles*

1985 is simply the best DCI show ever done. Period.

1993 is power, performance and ENTERTAINMENT.

1984 not only set the modern standard (82 & 83 were toes in the water), but it, with '85 & '87, is the epitome of Ensemble.

1995 is their best ever not to win. So much Wow.

1997 was Sacktig's best drill with terrific music.

******************************************************

2004: I could fall asleep to this snoozefest.

2006: <barf>

2008: <rebarf>

2010: <choke on barf>

2016 & 2017: Lost tradition and identity. Something's gotta give. But it won't.

 

[Jeff Ream]

man, another tough one.

 

87

93

89

00

11

 

HM 98 and 82....the show that started it all...still never gets the credit 83 does.

 

least favorite...tie 06 and 14

[BRASSO]

3 hours ago, dans said:

I agree with your least favorites; however, 2007 Cadets was one hell of a drum corps. One of the best I have ever seen. If only they would have been given a better show.

 Thats true. Lots of Corps, not just the Cadets, have had seasons where the marcher talent was good, but the design staff struck out that season. It happens. I've also seen Staff in many Corps over the years give its members a potentially great show, but the MM talent wasn't available to them that season, so the staff regrettably had to water down the demand left and right, do rewrites, etc... to the point the original show design that was given to the Corps was almost unrecognizable from the earlier designed one for them. Its a tough balancing act.

Edited December 20, 2017 by BRASSO

[Huntington Mallets]

1. 2000

2. 2005

3. 2007

4. 2003

5.1992

 

I consider every single one of these among the best drum corps shows of all time.

Edited December 20, 2017 by Huntington Mallets

[mingusmonk]

Most fav
1983
1984
1987
1989
2011

Least fav

2010
2014
2016

[ftwdrummer]

Top five, in no particular order, with the caveat that I have trouble figuring out how to consider shows before about 1987, just because high-cam vids don't seem to exist and the multi-cam direction was pretty terrible (1983 would probably be on here if I could find a good video of it that doesn't have bizarre cuts; ditto with 1984):

-2000. One of my go-to examples for introducing people to what drum corps can be. And I get a little bit of a tear in my eye every time I watch the multi-cam, when the camera cuts to the guard person barely holding her emotions together at the tail end of the company front, before launching into that delightful final drill.

-2005. Tied the high score record for a reason--it's a danged good show. The ballad is delightful; the symbols Sacktig was able to weave into the drill in the opener were fantastic; THAT DRUM BREAK (including the one aspect of drumming that that show got perfectly that no one else seems to, the singing through parts).

-2007. If I didn't include placement in my personal weighting of drum corps shows, this one would probably be my favorite Cadets show. Some people disliked the narration; for me, it nails the Hammerstein-esque heart of the material it was going for. And that drill--there's a BLOODY REVERSE Z-PULL COLLAPSE INTO A COMPANY FRONT AND IT'S PRACTICALLY BACKGROUND.

-1990. The Z-pull rewind is fun. So is the now-underutilized "let's just play some good music from this person" show concept (the last one I specifically recall where the center principle was the composer was SCV 2010, with the Bartok show--while Cadets 2013 was all Barber, that was somewhat incidental to the show concept). Some delightful guard work as well, and some fascinating staging work with how the battery was used in the ballad (which, speaking of: fantastic ballad).

-2011. Great music--the demonic Doxology was fantastic. One of the more striking visual concepts ever (splitting the corps and at times writing the corps as two separate corps, with conductors and pit unifying the two sides). Shouts to that battery for re-learning the show on an off day (more shouts to the pit for covering the battery's laundry duty so they could do that). Really just a great, great show.

HM:

-2009. Because (a) it's my generation of fan's WSS, and (b) the HNC-->G-->CB-->75 drill in "Tonight."

-2013. Mostly for the Prosperie tape. But it too fell under what seems to happen more often with Cadets than other corps (imo)--shows that are disliked in the moment, but people go back and say "hey, that was actually really good" afterward.

-2001. Because fun music is fun and it's a good show to bike to.

-2017. That show was a hot mess, but I still kinda love it in a weird way, even though every time they made a good change, they seemed to add a bad one at the same time.

Least favorites:

-2006. Somehow the first Cadets show I ever saw. It was sad.

-2008. I could tell what they were going for, but if you're going to do a radio show on the field, it works better in the style of Colts 2015.

-2014. This would likely be an HM if they'd gone up-beat ending. Slow over-patriotic ending was a bit much, even if I got what they were going for with it. Great narrator, though.

[Fran Haring]

7 hours ago, dans said:

I agree with your least favorites; however, 2007 Cadets was one hell of a drum corps. One of the best I have ever seen. If only they would have been given a better show.

I agree with you about how good that corps was. Their horn line was insane that year.

I did not care one bit for the narration... not necessarily the dialogue, but the audio quality... which I thought was substandard. To say the least.  LOL.