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Somehow I don't think the rules allow corps to do that ...

while it lasts... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arQx_NQIk9s

Actually, Spirit of Atlanta began playing Salvation back in the late 70s, long before the corps moved to Jacksonville for a few years. But Spirit has had a close connection to JSU since the very beginning. Spirit's founding director was a JSU alumnus, and many of the charter year members were from JSU. Our first warmup chorale in 1977 was Navy Hymn, and Jim Ott arranged Salvation for us in 1978 or 1979, I believe after hearing the Marching Southerners play it.

Wow. What a joy to listen to this afternoon. Can't wait to see what the design adds to the music.

Band of Brothers was Michael Kamen. Kamen borrowed many of the themes for Band of Brothers from himself. Listen to BoB then New Moon in the Old Moons Arms (PR 2010 source music) and you'll hear the connections.

And from what I've heard, drum corps can't use Thomas Newman's music anymore.

Thanks for the clarification!

From what I understand, Scouts played it a lot as a warmup/rehearsal piece.

Percussion programs take a few years to build. Not sure if any staff can "fix" it in a season. The other issue is they're are some corps out there with monster percussion programs (SCV, Cadets, BD, Coats, Cavies), that probably aren't going anywhere.

Human metronomes? Being someone who's studied conducting and uses that skill on a regular basis, I have to disagree. One of the more recent Scout DM's, Dean Phalen was a great conductor. If you look at the great conductors of orchestras over the years, many could also be considered human metronomes based on they're technique. As for all time DCI...Daniel Veerhusen. No question.

They must not have liked going the serious route and decided to return to their more popular VK, Florida Wave, Bridgemen style of shows. If it works for them and the corps is having a great time; more power to them.

Something very special is brewing here in Fort Mill in 2015. I am speechless with what I saw and heard today. :)

2015 Jersey Surf: "Sun Surfing"

LOL! When I first saw this thread, I wondered why the OP was only asking about those particular 7 years of BAC being in finals..until I noticed the date. The fact shouldn't be lost on anyone that BAC has now been a finalist for 16 years in a row, making the corps one of the most consistent Top 12 corps in DCI. There are, what , only a half dozen groups that have put together 16 year finalist strings. This is, imo, noteworthy in itself.

4 day camp this weekend due to national holiday on Monday. Brass and percussion join together to hear the Dm's tales of China journey after last camp. Maybe news of '15 show will leak out... Voila!

Just a bit of a bone of contention about attorneys making their bones on contentions. Only a small percentage of attorneys are litigators. I would hazard that much more time in the profession is spent helping people avoid contentious situations.That said, some medical malpractice attorneys make their contentions on bones.

This is actually about Crown '14 rather than '15, or so I guess, but I didn't see the need to resurrect the older thread for an idle question. The photo's a bit grainy: are these high school band instructors watching what I think they are?

Hello, We're interested in your remaining Kanstul 3-valve soprano. Please send pictures, especially of the damaged areas. Do all valves, slides & water keys work correctly? Shipping to York, PA? Thanks. Brian Moul, Brass Instructor Lancers Alumni Drum & Bugle Corps golfnband@comcast.net

At risk of throwing this thread down a rabbit hole, I think this has more to do with corps getting their changes finalized and getting to the level of clarity that their members are capable of. The Cavaliers were not going to catch Crown last year. Crown was doing what they were doing way too well, and as a result, there was a clear competitive line between them for most of the season. A similar line existed between Vanguard and whoever was in third at a given time. Vanguard was great, but they weren't going to catch Cadets or Coats. It can look like those corps are being "slotted" into groups, but in reality the numbers just represent the consistency of those corps' performances from night to night.

D MT: Who said I was trying to stir up anything. Again another DCPer impugning motive without discussion, evidence, or context. The rest of the world refers to that as "rash judgment." I sarcastically kidded about 'rumor" because the person in question would be very well known in the activity given blood lines and history. I personally know and communicate to and from with the several parties referenced; but because it is individual members, the common courtesy is not to use their specific names unless they are individually public figures representing the corps in a public way. I merely point to the ebb and flow that is drum corps inside. That you don't care has nothing to do with the success that is Carolina Crown in season 26. Take your empty (dee MT) attacks back to Texasz with you.

This is obviously the work of the North Koreans.

Regarding 27th's 1980 show, my all time favorite show, no guard could do what they did, or Phantom in those years for that matter, not due to talent, but training. Those who marched in guards at that time had been training since they were probably eight or nine years old and for 27th, most started with feeder corps or with the bands or drill teams that were part of the CYO or Eastern Mass circuits. They were trained differently. Chances are those who were in BD's 2012 guard were training t the same age, but on different areas. However, I will say that I saw that show at least eight times that summer and the guard was always flawless, though they never thought they were flawless and constantly worked at perfection. I would say that guard was the most difficult show but I'd say 1979's PR guard was a close second ,and I still say should have won in 79 and 27th in 80. Regarding 2012 and 2013 Crown, I thought the 2012 drill was more difficult than 2013 but 2013 was cleaner. As far as the musical book, I would think that 2012 was more difficult but 2013 was better performed. However I will say that if arrangement has anything to do with eth question, what Crown did with Philip Glass and "Einstein at the Beach" was amazing. Now I would not have complained if Crown won the title in 2012, and actually thought they should have won semi's. I also believe the better corps won in 2013 and was thrilled to see it live, but for me the difference was not degree of difficulty, it was confidence. in 2012 Crown was out to win, but in 2013 Crown was out to be the best and that made the difference. Now as far as difficult shows, I'd have to give a shout out to 2002 Cavalier's "Frameworks" which required nothing short of perfection and 2008's one and only "Spartacus" by PR. As far as stunts are concerned, I still don't know how Cadets pulled off some of the stunts in that show, particularly when the horn line tricks. Maybe it's easier than it looks but it impresses me.

I'm not so sure about 2013 being only a notch or two easier, or even really THAT much cleaner, though the uniform did help with that. 2012 Crown is probably the hardest drill and body movement a corps has attempted (in certain aspects), and certainly showed everyone the limits of being that good in both brass and visual. But that show, while visually harder, wasn't designed as well as 2013. Also 2013 was pretty middle of the road difficulty visually (if anything i'd say shows peaked in sheer difficulty mid-2000s). They had an opener (sort of opener) and closer where they moved (for half of it) and that was kind of it, a walking drum break and ballad. Also Sprach outro (the last drill move of the show, the last thing, as a drill writer, you want your audience to remember) was an awkward half time baby step from a blob shape to an ill-shaped crown shape. Cadets shows any given year on pacing alone will usually be the hardest shows. Crown's brass book was probably the densest and cleanest any corps has done, but nothing a corps hasn't done before. It was mostly variations on a Bb scale and multiple corps have done the technique runs they've done. From the videos on youtube it's also apparent they play every lick multiple times in a show warm up. Take the first little run of "Rocky Point Holiday", have your trumpets in two groups and play it alternately and you get that show's main musical effect. That squiggly run is the same lick three times and not everyone plays, the bird and bela runs lasted longer and sounded harder. Crown's writers are really good at making it flashy and wow-pizzazzing you and most people have fallen for it very very hard. But it really is one for the books.

I once marched at a show in Canada where the staff failed to tell us there was a 55 yard line and two 50 yard lines. That was hard. Z

And the cavaliers ARE in trouble. You'll see.

This response is a joke. I don't believe Caleb or Travis said anything like this. The drill this year was on the verge of unreasonable.... The proof can be in the injuries and in the sound of the hornline. They simply could not march AND play the show. Watch it on video, these guys run! Compare that drill to bluecoats or Santa Clara.

All this talk about the Cavaliers being in trouble is absurd. Even the best corps has an "off" season now and then. To say the Cavaliers were in trouble by placing as high as they did in finals is just plain silly. Many corps would love to wind up in finals as high as the Cavaliers did. I am certain they will be back in top form by next summer with a very competitive as well as entertaining show as always.

Cavaliers had many issues this year. But they still came off entertaining to quite a few. In fact their little "dub step" thingy at the end got quite the crowd reaction. It was actually the only thing they visually performed together all year. Although I hated every second of it. They aren't in trouble. They'll be back competing for a title before we know it. The biggest thing I'm worried about it that they couldn't march their drill and the horns had a lot of issues all season long. I know there has been a lot of praise for their caption head on here. But I don't know about that. Yes they are certainly louder than they used to be, but the quality sure has been lacking. They still have some nice moments, but there are a lot of harsh sounds that need to be squashed by the horn staff. They are lucky they have talent, that's all I'm gonna say. I'm still trying to decide what was the bigger problem this year, performance or design. I mean they couldn't march that drill... it was quite hard. Gaines was great at wowing us with actual easy to march drill moves, and really smart staging, and really not much running going on while playing. Their drill this year was good, but hard. Hard to sound good while marching, especially since they were not marching their technique well in the first place. I don't know. My eyes and ears were just in disbelief. They'll get their #### together though. I hope. I really did not like the show. Drums were killer though...

The Cavaliers are folding next week, didn't ya'll hear??? Edit.. Sorry forgot the Take a week off of DCP and I lose my touch...

OK sorry - but I had to pure geniu

This was actually the point I was going for. I seriously doubt the Cavaliers are going to drop out of Finals next year. I also seriously doubt they'll rebound like 2012 never happened and be in the Top 3. In MODERN DCI, it takes years to rebound from sudden huge drops like this... Blue Knights 2000 - 6th (92.00) Blue Knights 2001 - 14th (83.90) Blue Knights 2002 - 13th Blue Knights 2003 - 13th Blue Knights 2004 - 10th Blue Knights 2005 - 10th Blue Knights 2006 - 7th (90.125) SCV 2004 - 3rd (96.825) SCV 2005 - 8th (88.650) SCV 2006 - 6th (92.350) SCV 2007 - 5th (94.175) Phantom 2008 - 1st (98.125) Phantom 2009 - 9th (89.900) Phantom 2010 - 6th (93.150) Phantom 2011 - 5th (95.050) Phantom 2012 - 3rd (96.550) The Cavaliers will more than likely be 5th-7th place next season, and maybe 3rd or 4th in 2014. But I would be stunned if they became an "instant contender" just one year where so much "went wrong" (not just visual design and execution; let's not forget they were 8th in Brass and Music Analysis, too).

If we look at things from a historical perspective, one could expect the Cavaliers to perhaps move up or down, 2 or 3 positions from their 9th place position of this season. Thats certainly within reason. Phantom Regiment went up 3 spots from 9th to 6th from 2009 to 2011 ( after moving up 3 spots from 4th to 1st from 07 to '08 ). To believe that a Corps will move up from 9th to ( say ) top 4 the following year is as likely as the Cavaliers moving down and out of the DCI Top 12 in one year from the 9th position. These placements shifts within the top 12 of 4 or more placement positions from one season to the next is exceedingly rare... and even rarer still since the 1980's.

You're comparing apples to oranges. That was a completely different era: different corps goals, different judging system, different show expectations. It's like comparing the dead-ball era to the live-ball era in baseball. For me, nothing from the early-80s and prior can be directly compared to the mid/late-80s and forward.

Was never too much a fan of this warmup because it doesn't do anything exciting. Crown has yet to find their RockyPoint/Phillip Bliss/Bb Progression#1/Space Chords/White Dawn (might be my favorite of all time)/etc...... What a great sound and fantastic release though lol

From the Oakland Crusaders back in the 70's. Joel something or other.....................

Ditto Joel Alleyne!!!