Leaderboard

I've been in and around the drum corps activity, on and off, since 1956 [yes, I said 1956!]. I've seen and been a part of some memorable moments throughout this span of time. However, I witnessed something on retreat last Saturday night that I've never seen before and I will remember for the rest of my life. The Reading Buccaneers Drum Corps had just regained the title with an incredible performance and the Empire Statesmen Honor Guard had been named best Honor Guard for 2012. The corps on retreat were being dismissed starting from the tunnel end of the field. When it became time for the Empire Statesmen to leave, I wheeled the Honor Guard towards the end of the field and prepared to march off. Just then, out of the corner of my eye I caught a flash of blue and black coming rapidly from my right side. It was the entire Buccs Honor Guard hustling in single file from their position further down the field to get in front of our Honor Guard to "present arms" and salute us for winning best Honor Guard. It was a sight and a gesture that will remain in each of the Empire Statesmen Honor Guard member's memories for a long, long time. Thank you Bill and the entire Buccs Honor Guard for doing this and congratulations, again, to the Buccaneer Drum and Bugle Corps for yet another incredible championship.

Jeff - you come across as the unreasonable one on this thread. The gentleman had an honest concern which you did not take time to understand what the issue was about. Simply put - he wants something more than a few words on a piece of paper. The judges have the time - let them help to improve the shows. Given the fact that the digital tech in place for the field corps is in place - the incremental cost to provide it to the I&E and Mimi programs is ZILCH. Very poor on your part to tell the Mini folks - ah go home and don't come back ! The activity is challenged and we want to sustain it, not see it fold in a few more seasons. Your approach of potentially turning people off of the activity really is so opposite your usual support for keeping it going. You don't have to agree with commentary - but don't put it down so hard either unless you have substantive reasons which make sense.

They truly are! The stories I heard about them last year and what I got to experience this year are incredible. The flood of Facebook posts to each others corps pages was really cool to see. When we went over to shake hands after scores, several of them didn't think it was good enough and started giving us hugs instead! These guys are a great group of people and its a shame that our corps don't get to spend more time together! Congrats Bucs! Cant wait to see you all again next season!

This has been a fun read since last night. What nobody really seems to realize or admit is that the whole I&E is just a PARTY to get the weekend started. I spent 25 year as a DCA director and I can tell you that if we spent 5 minutes total talking about mini corps championships at a DCA meeting, It was alot. One year they demanded a podium, One year they demanded music stands, one year a stage etc etc.When does it end guys? Im sure if zero mini corps signed up, The championships would continue. Even with only 7 corps in the mini corps this year, DCA had the best payed attendance at the shows since 1996. you guys want tapes? Bring them and a tape recorder yourself and hand it to the judge before you perform, See, Its that easy. And im going with my original feeling, Its just sour grapes.

In your opinion what was the most underrated hornline in DCI this last season and why. My personal opinion is the Crossmen. That hornline was rocking!

I decided about a week ago to audition for Troop, these are really exciting me. :)

Thanks for saying that those of us who didn't march BITD don't have real experience. The stands may not have always been full, but people were always on their feet when I marched.

I have been a drum corps fan since I saw my first McCormick how to marching video in the fall of 1975. I went to my firstDCI contest in Atlanta, GA in 1976. I have attended 3 DCI Championships (1980,1984 and 2000). I have a minor in music and I wrote for Drum Corps World from 1983-1996. With all of that drum corps fan experience up until last night I had never seen a DCA corps live. So here are some random observations: 1) The DCA corps are more fun to watch. They haven't got caught up in all the "I must play music the audience may not understand". 2) The DCA corps are not electronic junkies. My observations is the DCI corps have lost their way in the electronics. If I want to hear an electric piano I have plenty of Chick Corea CD's I can listen to at home. I go to a drum corps contest to hear brass, percussion, not MIDI music. The Blue Devils this year used mics for their soloist--I had no problem hearing any of the non-micro phoned DCA corps this evening. 3)The DCA Corps were not hung up on props. I know some of the DCA corps this year used props, but all the ones I saw were tastefully done, fit in the show and were not covering up for some lack of imagination drill design. 4) The fans of the DCA corps are more mature. The crowd was not full of high school band students. 5) I was surprised to find out that the upper deck of the stadium was not utilized for seat sales. I actually thought my ticket was in the second deck only to find myself considerably lower in the stands. 6) The DCA corps are not afraid to play loud. Nothing stirs up an audience like pure impact volume. Many of the DCI corps have cut back their volume level to sound more musical....bad trade. I don't expect a drum corps to sound like the London Symphony Orchestra. I guess the biggest surprise was the size of the crowd. The crowd was a fraction of what I saw at any of the DCI championships I have attended. The DCA corps are great! Many DCI fans maybe missing out on the best half of the activity. After the second open class corps of the evening I was wondering why I still followed DCI when this experience was so much better. The good news is I don't need to choose between the two halves of drum corps, but if I had to make a choice I would attend DCA first. I am already looking forward to attending next year. Scott Smith

I just wanted to put out there that I was SO happy to see/hear the Renegades at Prelims this year. I first saw them in 2004 and I fell in love with their attitude and style. In 2005, despite being on the field all season, their show was and still is one of my all time favorites. Entertainment top to bottom and pure "In your face" drum corps. The last few years I haven't enjoyed the Renegades show as much as that 2005 show. This year was my second favorite show to that 2005 show. A lot of the "weird" stuff was gone (no lego blocks, no bicycle on cymbal) but there was still a lot of "OMG" moments (drum major uniform? ). When I saw Roland coming out in his red shirt and prelims I had to hold my jaw from dropping. One of my favorite soloists and to finally hear him play live again was incredible. The show design and music was phenomenal. Regardless of score and placement I got my money's worth of entertainment from team 7 this year.

Oh...do you think I have issues with drugs and gang warfare? Not at all. Everybody here in the home loves drugs and we're all part of some gang. I happen to belong to the Quilts and our colors are many. I feel like I'm being called out, so let me just admit that I was always jealous of BJ's hair (and to avoid rumors, it's the hair on his head that I was jealous of).

SCV Bluecoats Spirit Crossmen. All great sounding lines. Crossmen had a VERY mature and unique sound. The flugel line helped that, but they are doing some great things there. I will always have my love for Aaron Goldberg as the caption head, he was given a ###### deal, impossible books to work with pretty much. But Jason is doing a GREAT job also. I'm 100% okay with the brass staff and hope they are there for a long time. They are great at teaching the style of the music that the Crossmen play also. Some tasty musical stuff going on in Texas! SCV had immense improvement from last year. I felt their book was the most lacking. But #### those mellos!!!! JD loves his mellos... and I like how this brass staff and line handled his agressive writing. You didn't lose the aggressive nature of the music but kept things within the realm of good brass playing. That wasn't always the case at Phantom. Bluecoats have consistently had great sounding lines for quite some time now. Has a lot to do with writing. But the writing is getting old for me, every show sounds the same to me now! But I'll keep the brass sound. Good stuff. Spirit had some great stuff going on as well. Very mature sound, very mature playing. Great balance. Great writing. Stood in front of their warm-up arc in Allentown, they get a REALLY pure sound. And they carried it onto the field pretty well! Really enjoyed their performance. I have to say horn lines across the board are really starting to get great. It used to be some ratty lines in the bottom half of the top 12. But you can talk about good horns all the way back to open class lines. Oregon Crusaders, amazing stuff. And the other top open class lines aren't to crappy themselves!!! It's nice to see good teaching going on across the board. Yeah there are some lines that are a little behind.. but they are catching up! Now my challenge to all the arrangers, write books to where your horn line can shine!!! Putting random runs interrupting melodic lines is not the answer, and frankly it's not hard to play F major scales up and down, even my slow trombone fingers can do that. Just don't be lazy, really take the time with voicings, that can really make all the difference in an impactful moment. Let your brass lines play some music also! It's okay to have a phrase develop. Too much stating 4 bars of the melody then we can't recognize the music anymore. It's been getting better. I'm just tired of hearing "drum corps" arrangements. If your team choses to play a piece of music, something about it was effective to make you want to play it, so keep the integrity of the piece! Also it's so much easier to clean something that makes musical sense. It's easier to shape it, to really make it effective. Okay, I could go on forever, but these are just my thoughts on some great sounding horn lines, and a little bit of my OPINION on the state of brass playing and arranging in drum corps.

Sounds like a terrible place to be, this purgatory.

I'd say: Bluecoats (I had them in 3rd...) Spirit Crossmen Pacific Crest

Translation: Drum corps was better when I marched and I spend every night crying in my soup because I can't like the activity for what it is today. Instead, I'll #### and moan and gripe about what drum corps should be like instead of taking my thumb out of my mouth and realizing that the kids on the field today are doing some incredibly hard stuff really freakin well. I know that there are a lot of other factors that contribute to slightly lower attendance than when I marched but I'll ignore them. Because I swear, we had 250,000 people in the stands at finals when I marched. Get over yourself, dude.

The Tampa Bay Thunder Drum and Bugle Corps is pleased to announce some additions and changes to the 2013 instructional team. The 2013 Thunder Brass Team will be led by Co-Caption Head Frank Williams and Dennis Laorenza that bring a tremendous amount of experience and professionalism to the Thunder as we enter our third year of DCA competition. Also, George De Guzman will return in a much more active role as Brass Coordinator. The Thunder’s Percussion Team will stay in tack for the 2013 season under the supervision of Co-Caption Heads Charlie George and Chris Bershad. Musical arrangements will remain in place with Ron Ellis writing the brass book and Omar Carmentes writing the percussion book. In addition, the Thunder has obtained the drill writing services of Jeff Bridges for the upcoming season as we focus on the corps third and pivotal year as an Open Class DCA corps. Other appointments and additions to the Tampa Bay Thunder staff will be announced shortly. We would like to thank those staff members that helped us grow during the past two season and wish them well with their future endeavors. Tampa Bay Thunder Drum and Bugle Corps

For the record, I don't believe that their show this past year really strayed too far from the base values of the Troopers. America's Corps playing arguably the most influential American composer's music doesn't stray far from the homeland, in my mind. I understand it didn't work. But I still think there was an effort to maintain the history while trying to take the corps in a new direction.

Why not ? I thought of Jersey Surf.

I may be in the minority here, but I actually really liked the Troopers music this past season and thought the brass was not a problem at all. I do think that they suffered from a problem that, quite frankly, I felt numerous corps suffered from this past season: questionable (at best) concepts/visual programming. The music on its own terms was very solid (albeit not necessarily the most in-your-face or "western" type show that people may want). But, when the music was placed in the context of the overall concept or theme for the show, it just didn't make sense and made it virtually impossible for the music to be effective. So, while cleaning house as a way of reloading the Troopers program may very well be a great move, I do not think it fair to attack the music (at least the brass) on its own from last season.

My soul.

DCP readers will no doubt miss your insights and enthusiasm next summer, but if you have the chance to wear blue and gold and compete across the country, take it.

This is very true, and it's also aligned with my belief that our memories of how things used to be are usually far better than they actually were. There's nothing wrong with remembering the best of times, but too often we let it fog our mind with "back in the day" thinking.

If mini-corps are not performing because they have issues with the judging, then they are doing it wrong, and good riddance. However, I don't think it's unreasonable to review the sheets and the criteria being used, and more importantly, the training in said criteria. I do think adding tapes is an idea, but not necessarily a good one. Why not be a bit different from the field corps, and allow the judge to take in and enjoy the performances without having to blab for ten minutes? What I'd suggest is a short critique after the show. That way minis would have access to the commentary they want without bloating the whole system. Frankly, when it comes to mini-corps, the fewer rules and regulations, the better. Other than performance time, performing member limits and stage size, I would not have any other rules. Not one rule on instrumentation or electronics (use whatever you want). Judge the whole darned thing on GE Music only.

When Erie scored 105, everyone cracked up, congratulated their fellow corps members and "competitors" for turning the place on, raised their glasses and partied til about 3. There was a time - not too long ago - when the winners were announced to a near empty hall as 2,500 people had gotten up and left after the last performance. They were out of their chairs to begin with (standing o), so they took the next logical step...to the party. Even the performers left the building. You'd hear them an hour later with a beer in their hand asking, "how'd we do, anyway?" Who we doing this for anyway? Was it more fun when it didnt matter so much? Its a gift that DCA figured this Mini Corps thing out in the first place. There is NO OTHER PLACE IN ALL OF DRUM CORPS that 18 horn outfits can get top billing, a "must see" mystique, draw a huge audience and have them throwing babies at the end. NOWHERE. Comparing where we were to where we are.....looking at this thread...did the pendulum swing a little far? where's the fun? and where's the focus? look how seriously we are taking ourselves....show design deficiencies compared to the other corps? Really? It's I&E. All the groups and individuals....snare, ensemble, flag, chorus get one thing when they leave...a sheet...with about three comments on it and a score. Mini corps are a shade bigger than the brass ensembles (who get one of those sheets, 3 comments and a score). And everyone's having a ball. Maybe less is more. It might be time to have the winner of Mini Corps by applause meter and chuck the sheets (and tapes) altogether. Come to think of it, that might work. (and it would STILL be a contest ) Stay tuned.

HBD, Your response in your "side note" that DCA judging now uses digital recordings indicates to me that you don't fully understand the situation. Audio recording does not occur with Mini Corps - that is the issue. Furthermore your "100%" statement about placement being the driver is just plain wrong. It has nothing to do with the situation, as this issue has been raised on many occasions over the last five years, and no progress has been made in rectifying the situation. It comes down to the future viability of the activity itself, as more and more Mini Corps are deciding to stay home. The original poster is correct, in that there are no judges tapes, (or digital recordings of any kind) furnished to competing Mini Corps. Three score sheets are produced with no correlation between them. One sheet had only these three comments: "Aggressive Book", "Well Done", and "Excellent Job" followed by a score. There are no category breakdowns on the sheet. There are no critiques or opportunities to have judges explain a given score. There are no recap sheets produced. There is no way of determining if there is a deficiency in show design, content, execution, performance, etc. There is no opportunity to measure strengths and weaknesses vs the competition. Since there is zero judging feedback, next year's show by default is developed in a vacuum. Could you imagine a scenario in which the Caballeros (for example) received a single score, with no granularity as to how it was arrived at, coupled with no information as to what any other corps scored in any category, and no opportunity to question the judges as to how the score was arrived at? Their score sheet simply said "Nice Job". One can only imagine that the second place corps score sheet said "Really, Nice Job" I suspect that this would be the subject of much more discussion if it were Open Class Corps instead of Mini's. Mini Corps spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours of time in developing the shows that you see on Friday night at the I&E. We truly enjoy the opportunity to compete, and the thrill of performing in front of a wonderful crowd. Shouldn't Mini Corps have access to the same professional judging evaluation that is afforded to all other competing drum corps?

Maybe it is, Maybe it isnt. But maybe contacting the judging administrator for DCA and having a civil conversation with the man rather than posting on DCP would be the better solution. The original post just sounds like sour grapes to me. And im 100% sure if his team won without tapes being supplied im sure we wouldnt be reading this post tonight. On a side note ... This was also the first full season the DCA has NOT used tapes for judging, They have gone to a MP3 type of recorder where the tabulator sends the judges critique directly to the corps directors cell phone for distribution to staff. pretty high tech! Believe it or not , This system SAVES money from the old "cassette tape" method. Im sure the days of judges tapes in DCA are over for ever, Especially for a one time per season event as the mini corps show.

If you really want to like BD...like them! Don't try to force, but don't lie to yourself, either.

This statement says it all. Can you imagine kids today wanting to be a part of the activity the way it looked in the 1970s?

It's all about opinions just because something has evolved into something you don't really agree with, doesn't mean it's evolved for the worse. I suspect there are a lot of vets from the 1960s who look upon 1980s Drum Corps the same way some who marched on the 1980s look upon todays Drum Corps. You evolve or you die, it applies to all walks of life including Drum Corps.

I will throw 30 for Orlando FL

Alumni Spectacular Lancers Alumni – I absolutely loved your arrangement of The Star Spangled Banner. I don’t think I’ve ever heard that arrangement before and it was just lovely. You had a wonderful show and I loved the change of pace with the singing. Nice work by the guard. Also thanks for the info regarding the battery drums. That’s going to be a great help. Freelancers Alumni – We performed selections from Jesus Christ Superstar with the Naval Hymn as our warm up. The audience seemed appreciative of the show. We love having the additional performance opportunity of the Alumni Spectacular. Makes the corps’ trip all the way out from Cali that much more satisfying being able to perform at the Alumni Spectacular, which is my favorite show of the entire weekend, by the way. Blessed Sacrament Golden Knights Alumni, Toronto Optimists Alumni, Yankee Rebels Alumni – You guys were my Jolesch picture-taking, pit equipment pushing/loading, hurry back to the stands corps so I didn’t get to see you. Mighty St. Joe’s Alumni – I get excited just typing that name! Really amazing show. Georgia. Goosebumps. The end. I don’t know what else to say. I love you guys. Oh yeah, the single tenors were neat and picking up the shakos… very funny. Hopefully your drummer was okay after the show. Yes I know I use the word “love” too much in these reviews. I don’t care. It’s the Alumni Spectacular. Lots of love going around. Preston Scout House Alumni Band – It’s no secret. You guys are my favorite Alumni Corps AND it turns out I was sitting in front of your cheering section during the show. Yay!! I’m always amazed by the glock player. How do you play that and march at the same time? It doesn’t seem possible. I’m in awe. Of course your DM is my favorite DM of the entire weekend and my corpmates are sick of me telling the story of how I got to meet him at the hotel last year. I don’t care. I’m telling that story forever. Oh yeah, back to the show… It was awesome. More awesomeness. Even more awesomeness. TOY SOLDIERS… my favorite part of the whole weekend again this year! And then you ended with some awesomeness. I may be a little biased in my review. P.S. I was told the 2013 calendar wasn’t available yet this year. I need my fix so someone tell me when they’re ready. Reilly Raiders – Strong, strong guard. Amazing job weapons line. Whoever wrote that guard book deserves a medal. So simple (as in old school, not necessarily easy), clean and effective. The corps as a whole made some huge fans of Freelancers Alumni at the show. They absolutely went crazy over your tribute medley with all the uniforms and corps references as did the rest of the audience. It was all just a little before my time but my corpmates were out of their seats hooting and hollering. Don’t get me wrong, just because I didn’t quite know the significance of some of the songs doesn’t mean a darn thing. It was still so much fun. Your show was the definite favorite of all the guys I was at the show with. And the bottle dance into Bridgemen. Very nice. Park City Pride – First, kudos to guard again. I mean the cymbals, I mean the guard. Gosh, I don’t even know what else to say. I was totally enamored by the guard and they had some beautiful silks to boot… oh and the backfield DM. Very entertaining. I love the philosophy of how this group was formed and I’m so grateful I get to see your wonderful shows every year. New York Skyliners Alumni – Oh Skyliners, Skyliners, Skyliners. You guys. No, seriously… you guys. Starting with Aquarius. I don’t know what it is about that song but it always moves me and with the Skyliners sound... perfection. And Summertime and New York, New York. Love it! You guys are always my favorite “sound” of the Alumni Spectacular if that makes any sense. I am truly desperate for you guys to do a mini corps show again in the vein of this show and the mini corps show you performed in 2007. Pretty, pretty please with a cherry on top? Bridgemen Alumni – Yay. I’ll say it again. Yay. Just so you know I’m stealing the backing up beep “bit”. Every time I have to back up for any reason for the rest of my life I’m going to beep and then of course I’ll think of you guys. I did miss the city sounds of the car horns and whatnot from last year’s show, but I guess I’ll let it slide if you promise to put it back in next year. Don’t know what else to say except you rocked. Hawthorne Caballeros Alumni – I was so excited. I never got to actually see the Call to the Bull before and I was sitting right next to the group when Mr. Ponzo played it this time. So exciting! I love the fact that the competitive corps takes to time out to support the Alumni Corps. It must be such a blessing to have such an active, large, supportive organization as the Caballeros. Now on to the performance of all you swishy pants alumni. Two words; loved it. Did you think I was going to say anything else? I was tearing up at Don’t Cry for Me Argentina. So beautiful and a bit haunting actually. A very nice moment along with The Prayer and beautiful, beautiful silks. Amazing job tonight. I did want to do a special shout out to all the Alumni guards. You’ve all improved so much over just the last three years and I love it. You all are so much fun to watch. I am also including Boston in that statement even though they weren’t here this year because they, too, have a wonderful guard. Also, huge thanks to Kevin Gamin and company with the Live from the Pressbox blogs to help refresh my memory to write these reviews so many days after the fact. Lastly, I know these Alumni “reviews” are pretty useless and offer no true substance as far as a review goes… but they're fun and I don’t care. So there.

I'm excited brass-wise for this year, definitely. I just hope the visual team is up to par... I don't want Troop to look like Madison. Take that however you will, but the visual team (not design) was probably the best/most consistent part of the corps for the last five years.

I rarely if ever look at those or worry 'bout 'em myself. It does beg to ask why people would downcheck a polite and factual press release. Sheesh!...

OK then...I designed a show to fit the rules of the game, Since I had input into how we would get judged, size of the field....(which BTW were similar to the stage in Rochester 60'x60' or 20 yards square). Even thought out a show that had ties to the area....(Civil War) (Yankee Rebels), costuming, stylisitically, idiomatically correct and performed to best abilities of our performers. We came in third. Our performers did the very best we could do. We are very proud of the performance we put out there at DCA. Star watched from the tunnel and I have a feeling that they understood we did not just hand them the trophy. I was honestly approached by many people and I am still getting comments that this could have been the year that they got knocked off. I am sort of OK with that. The original idea of "visual enhancement" was apparent throughout the show. "Visual enhancement" is NOT drill, it is meant as ways to "visually enhance" the music effectiveness. This is not Star United's fault! For some reason there has been no training to what is "drill to do drill" and well thought out ways to "visually enhance" a show. IM (biased) O, Ghost Riders did that best. Heck, we even had "military bearing". ($1.00 to Gary Matczak). But alas, we did not do drill the best. The point is the teams like Erie, a perennial winner for years, Golden Eagles, a DCA mini corps Champion, and other teams just aint coming anymore. Oh I also forgot to tell Jeff and others that besides all the aforementioned fees we have, there is also a 100.00 dollar entrance fee. So yeah we care about fair treatment. I am actually for the Op's contention that we still havent figured it out, and have continously volunteered to help the activity stay alive and grow. So there is some work to do in the off season, and I truly believe that DCA could not have a better guy than Kevin Hassan to push things into the right direction. I also believe that if Minne Brass or Ghost Riders were announced first and or second, the crowd would not have booed for the first time in a number of years. So be it... in the record books. But before we jump on a bandwagon that the OP is whining about a placement, I didnt get that from his concern. We need to look at some of this stuff, and it's OK. DA

You guys make drum corps fun!!! Very nice job. I told you guys that water had magic in it.

pub crawl....I dont like this at all, we work too hard to be judged in a pub.

At least her view of the field won't be blocked!!!

Glad you agree with me. You quoted exactly what I said this time... "Sure it is. For all practical purposes, for corps that participate in DCI...DCI is drum corps to those corps and members. Is it literally drum corps? No, but for any sense that matters, it is...to those corps."

I missed this due to being overseas during that time, but I'm relieved you were able to bring us this latest news. May justice be served and may his memory be preserved.

well, let's break down BD. the whole dada thing wasn't exactly emotionally engaging unless you're into dadaism. nothing was familiar about it to the average fan. When I see a hobby horse, I think of a small kids toy, not a movement of elitist artists.

No review is 'useless' to those of us who perform in and teach the Alumni Corps, Cathie. Early and mid-season reviews especially help us get an objective view of our show and enable us to focus on improvements. After all, we are not judged, except by the audiences. Though yours comes at the end of our outdoor exhibition season, thank you for your enthusiastic review of the show. Reviews such as yours give us great satisfaction to know that our fans enjoy what we have put on the field for them, and may even influence decisions regarding future routines. It's all good when anyone reviews a performance and gives us the outside observer's point of view. For example, can you believe that there were some misgivings about combining 'The Prayer' and 'Argentina' initially? Comments like yours only serve to confirm that the right decision was made last winter! Thank you for taking the time to put your thoughts on DCP. Too bad you didn't get to see Blessed Sacrament, Toronto and the Rebels -- They are great corps too, and I know they would have appreciated your comments as well. Please continue to submit your reviews when you can. Fun for you to write them and fun for us to read. All the corps appreciate them, I am sure!

Mike, It may just be time to look at the Mini Corps activity and the whole judging system again. We probably need a new sheet specific to mini corps. We have talked about tapes for a long time, and maybe now is the time to implement them. The fact that we are not gaining members and actually losing corps needs to be looked at closely. I am sure that these issues will be addressed. If we all stay cool about this, it will happen. Kevin Hassan is very receptive and aware that some things could be better. Donny

... wrong thread by chance?

Mike is saying DCI IS drum corps. That simply is not true. The problem here on DCP or any other blog is that people speak untruths enough times the start developing the groundwork to speak it AS the truth. MikeD doesn't believe there is a difference, that is ok, there are many that live in alternate realities and you are allowed to do that. But, the truth is DCI = an organization of member corps. DCI is most certainly NOT drum corps. That is all.

Having any fan involvement in the decision of placement is really an idea that will only create chaos, and a more frustrating competitive environment for the corps as well as the fans IMO. The judging system, today or any other time period, is subjective and will rarely land the way all of the fans can agree no matter what changes are implemented. The real issue as I see it, is the entertainment of the fans. From reading posts, especially ones over the last several weeks, I feel that fans in general (not speaking for everyone) are disappointed in the lack of accessibility to the show music, and sometimes the theme, for those that seem to be at or near the top on a regular basis. It is a feeling of "corps X is playing to the sheets, not to the fans" and to some degree I think that is a fair assessment (and this is not a BD bash. Other corps have been guilty of this over the years as well). Some corps have clearly attempted to push the activity, yet try and be more fan friendly in the process. What I would like to see, and I suspect is the feeling of several others, is to have the fan friendly portion be more important. I am not sure how this would be achieved, however I feel VERY strongly that allowing any portion of the competition be decided by fans is not the answer to this issue. I do enjoy the dialogue on how we get what is desired. It would be nice to have "the powers" listen to some of us fans on this issue. And I also think the Cesario project is a step in the right direction, but I fear Michael is so close to the inside that what we desire may never be seen on the field. I hope I am wrong, and I will stick around to see how it all plays out.

Why would they want to build it on a national level? Right now, the northeast corps have the championships, and they have the fan base to support it....WITHOUT supporting it at a national level. They don't have to go anywhere to see it in their own back yard. IF it's built up on a national level, they risk having to go somwhere else, which costs them money. Or just not going, which means losing out on the activity they love. As for reciprocity, the non NE corps invited themselves a long established party already in progress. It's ridiculous for them to say, "well, now that WE are here, let's move the party closer to us."

I understand what you are saying here, but in that situation, you are asking your students to approach a performance completely differently from a rehearsal. For many of us, the phrase "rehearse as you will perform" is engrained in our heads from the first day we pick up an instrument. Its been a huge part of my mentality throughout my career, both playing and teaching. So, it would make sense to pick a philosophy and stick to it throughout both, rather than risk inconsistency in a performance. I get that what you do works for your band, but that's why you're getting comments to the contrary.

That's too bad, jennifo did a great job these last few years. Wish her the best!

The person who posted that comment lacks basic math skills.

.

There has been a mention on BK's FB that Marc Sylvester won't be coming back next season. This was posted by a BK member who received an email from Director Mark Arnold. I haven't seen a formal announcement from BK.