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It still amazes me that we had piano, saxophone and bassoon players in that line. I have taught and still teach the best horn lines in DCI and, these days, kids have to practically be masters on their brass instrument to have a chance to make the line.

I imagine the controversy could be maxed out if The Battalion did this.

I do not believe that the geography matters at all to prospective world class members. I think some of us are trying to apply 1970s-1980s sensibilities to a wholly different generation. More than 60% of BAC is from Texas, for example. Two decades ago, that 60% came from Florida, and two decades before that, 80% were from Massachusetts. In Boston's case, as the activity evolved, so did they. Open Class corps continue to be more locally based, which makes complete sense. This is not necessarily as new as some here might think. I recall that when I was alive 40 years ago, there was an article in Drum Corps News reporting that many of Blue Devils drummers had southern accents because they had come over from Spirit. I personally know 5 members of BD this year. One is from Virginia, two are from Texas, and two from Florida. The only California kid I know is in Boston's drum line.

You are 100% correct. I live in Murrieta and my both my kids went to Vista Murrieta, my son was in the band all four years and is class of 2022. I have to ask my son, but I believe Vista Murrieta was supposed to Grand Nationals in 2020, but Covid hit. My son's sophomore year in 2019, Vista did go to San Antonio and did quite well. I believe they finished 17th out of 80+ bands. I heard the Texas crowd showed them lots of love and they were a crowd favorite. What's interesting about 2019 as well was that Ayala went to Grand Nationals and I remember hearing they did very well. Vista and Ayala duked it out multiple times during that season out here, and they traded wins by tenths of a point, so i wonder how Vista would have done had they went to GN that year too. But in the grand scheme of things you are spot on.

I agree though I think the argument could be made for Bloo in 2019. Many also say Phantom in 89, but where I love SCV in 1989 just as much, I was happy either way.

I’ll set the scene: DCI finals. Field is empty. Crocker: “On the field, presenting their show Counterportatiom, Drum Corps International is proud to present The Mars Vanguard.” Corps suddenly appears on field….

Without question in my head anyway, 27th Lancers 1980. The biggest rip in DCI history.

https://cadets.org/cadets-announce-music-educator-liaison Commitment to the Erie area being shown to be true! This is amazing for my Western PA community and music education here. I've known Carl for years and his passion and enthusiasm for music education is off the charts.

Well I obviously I am not and won't speak for everyone, but I just talked to my son and confirmed that Vista Murrieta was indeed supposed to go to Grand Nationals in 2020 before Covid wiped everything out. And the Vista kids and the staff cared. They wanted to go and compete. Again that's just one SoCal school, but they cared and had their reasons for going.

Whenever someone does Book of Mormon.

More cool & positive vibes (pun kind of intended) from The Surf. I could have really used one in college. The "MarimbaPad": https://www.dci.org/news/the-mother-of-invention-jersey-surf-secures-patent-changes-practice-game-with-marimbapad?utm_source=sfmc&utm_medium=email

2021 Blue Stars contra tech here. Loved working with those cats. 😂

All very interesting and I will accept it as completely accurate, though it has little relevance to the challenge facing VMAPA. The topic is how VMAPA can best position itself for revival. Insofar as that question involves recruiting from the pool of interested students in its own backyard, the competitive success of CA HS bands at BOAGN would seem to have nothing to do with the answer. What makes an individual student eager, motivated and qualified to seek membership in SCV, and what makes a HS music program competitive at a national level among other HS bands, are considerations that are almost completely removed from each other, aside from the fact they both concern music/dance performance. Consider, for example, that one reason why CA bands don't factor into BOA more prominently is that GN is held in Indianapolis -- a hugely expensive travel and logistical proposition for a 250-member ensemble of California-based minors, and all the associated support. Even in the Midwest, just getting to BOA regionals requires total program buy-in from the principal's office and a massive, engaged booster organization that works fundraising 24/7. Whipping up support for the vision falls largely on the back of the band director, so BOA success ends up being a function of the personality and drive (and sacrifice of sleep) of one person, and the resources they can summon from the school's community. For a band director in California, the burdens are even heavier if only because of their distance from the Heartland. And all of this has just about zero influence on whether a guard member in Poway has the interest, discipline, and chops to audition for Santa Clara -- or on SCV's ability to find and recruit her. The whole question on the table here is whether VMAPA can revive its competitive stature by finding membership from California. I think the answer is emphatically yes, and that the vicissitudes of the CA HS marching band scene are nearly irrelevant to the question. If you're going to make the argument that competitively successful DCI corps require ready and proximate access to BOA-National-caliber HS band programs, I think you've got an entirely different argument on your hands. It's an argument that's going to have to explain the legions of kids who have left places like Iowa -- or heck, places like San Diego -- to join top-level drum corps, and explain BD's 20 rings.

If moving to Open Class is DCI Purgatory, then moving from WC/OC to SoundSport must be DCI H*ll. Lasciate ogne speranza, voi

My Auntie was in the RCC (Riverside Community College) color guard in the late 80's early 90's. Back then I remember hearing that RCC was known as "Blue Devils South" because over half the band marched for BD in the summers, and a vast majority of them were SoCal kids who would migrate up to Concord. No idea if it's still like that today for RCC.

This, all day long.

Yes.... and Cavies 1990

I have another solution to save money. Have all the corps move to Texas and tour Texas. I'm not biased or anything.... lol!!!

Marching Music’s Maple League.

Hello Quinn, Thanks for the opportunity to talk about drum corps in Canada. There is so many aspect we could talk of. This email could be 3000 pages!! Lets start with a few observations. There might be many ways to grow the activity but the one who will succeed are the ones people believe in and are ready to invest time, energy, talent et money. We have those people at Stentors, pushing for a yearly DCI tour. Those people will not invest their time for a parade corps, a local marching band or a local whatever. The day DCI tell the Stentors we have to go "soundsport" it will be our last day. No one here want to invest 5 minutes in something less than competing drum corps. We will die as no one will take over for this new "orientation". We have 2 parades corps in Quebec. Both led by passionnate people ready to invest time, energy, talent and money for that purpose. They could never do a DCI tour. Their kids don't want that. Their parents don't want that. Their staff don't wanna do that too. Stentors could never go back to parade and local shows. Everybody here would leave. Staff, members, volunteers. Everybody. That said... In order to help ourself, we try to put a feeder corps in action most years (not coming out this year). They stay local. They come without prior music knowledge. Last year we invest roughly 30 000$ US to promote music at daycare in 26 city. We met almost 2000 kids during the summer, making them play brass, drums, danse or spinning a flag. You see, music is dying in school and it is a small org like the Stentors who try to reverse the situation for an entire province. What we do is a drop in an ocean. Can't do it alone. Drum corps is dying not because it is not worth it but because the society has changed. I don't know in Ontario or USA but here, people start working at McDonald when they are 12-13 years old now. School bring them in South America and Europe as end-of-the-year travel. You're better offer something worth it if you want to catch their interest. Back to your questions! While I may agress with Daniel Buteau and yourself, Stentors is a different bird. This is why we are still here 20 years after everyone else's gone. We don't do things that we can't deliver. We had our share of staff earning 20$/day on tour as recently as 2015. Travelling on school bus, cooking our own food to save a few dollars, etc. The sacrifice the people made to make this corps grow financially solid is astonishing. We made so many sacrifice which wouldn't have been done for something else than DCI drum corps. This is our passion. (2022) We did not finish lower or higher than year past financialy (2017-2022). We raised our tuition from 1050$ US to 1600$ US to cover both plane tickets needed (Montreal-LA / San Francisco-Chicago). Everything else was just the same as usual for us (1 month tour + housing + food, ect.). Tuition is about 14% of our yearly budget. It cover about only transportation expenses. No more no less. We don't coun't on tuition to pay our bills. From 2007-2019, tuition was only 8% of the budget. Yes by raising the tuition it became a little bigger percentage of it all. We are still VERY low. Can I add that many members take advantage of discountswe offer (for volunterring and more). 50% don't pay the total 1600$ in tuition. One year we offered every camp for 0$ to all. To our surprise we didn't gain one more kid. In fact we lost a few more at the beginning of the summer. Now that is it more expensive, people pay way more on time. Go figure! How much did our California tour did cost? 34 000$ US - Plane ticket 12 000$ US - Extra on housing 20 000$ US - Bus rental Food = as usual Gaz = as usual (more to bring the trucks in, less during the 2 weeks as we did not move much) If we hadn't been in California I'd fear we would not have comeback. If brought kid, staff, volunteers back. It brought more people in every aspect of the org. It help raised more money than ever. It stimulate people to give more time and efforts. All the gains we had with California last year are still paying off today as we will bring our second biggest corps since 1999 (60) next summer. Along with a bigger staff and more volunteers. We run a tight ship here. There is not many dollar spent without a good reason (we drop a dollar to much here and there of course...but not often). Dare I say "we eat better than everyone else"? Yes I do. 😉 We are not repeating the same mistake Quebec and Ontario have made since DCI hosted finals in Montreal, 1981. We never been. We never "cut" members who were too young or not talented enough. We have started all over again as many time as needed when a large chunk of older members would leave at the end of a season. We are adapting yearly at the multiple challenges trow at us by events, society changes and rising cost. Until 2022, we still played on our old G bugle. Our drumline usually last at least 20 years, so does our uniform. We are not chasing the American glory and that doesn't steals an opportunity to inspire a young Canadian to take up music. In fact we still take kids with no music background and inspire our members to go further in music, nourrishing their passion for it. School with Stentors alum teaching are doing better than the other music program because of grit, passion, dedication they show at work. I believe, learn in part with us. We will not set up for less and will never look at group with a different goal, objective and caliber with disdain. We need a vibrant music scene in order for all of us to do well. And we try hard to show the path forward.

All this SCV news and detail leaves me confused: Are the clowns being sent in or sent away?

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