Jump to content

Leaderboard

Popular Content

Showing content with the highest reputation on 03/26/2023 in Posts

  1. 1994 Brass Theater version, ( with drill), of Medea/ Strings for Percussion and Celeste. ….And yes, even in this version, the crowd is heard screaming “ Do it! “ after the FFF ( triple forte) chord in Medea, and into the the accelerando. As a side note….as someone who appreciates demand in drill and music equals movement, both 1993 Star and Cadets have to be all time champions of drill speed and demand. It was as if each was pushing the other to raise doctor beat a bit more in practice and just turn on the after burners in tempo on the field that year. This video, I think, shows that demand that was present in the drill extremely well. We get to see, close up, what an individual needed to do in movement and playing.
    4 points
  2. 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.
    2 points
  3. If someone already started a thread on this then my apologies. This is not meant to be some long post or thread but I found myself watching Star of Indiana's 1993 show last night and it felt as modern as ever. The performance of the brass and percussion was really stunning and sounded as good as I remembered when seeing them live. I found myself blown away by the overall construction of the show. It's amazing to me that after 30 years this show still feels modern, unique, and has seemed to age very well. I know it was not everyone's cup of tea, and I admit it took me a while to adjust to it at the time. I know the subject of how people feel about this show has been beat like a cheap drum so I don't want to go there, but I wonder how people feel the show has aged from an objective perspective. I guess for me I can't believe it's been 30 years (or almost 30 years since the 2023 season has not started just yet). From my perspective the show has aged well. It was immense in what it brought to design from a timing perspective, body movement, musical flow, and overall visual design. The show would likely still feel uncomfortable to many fans even today. The music was complex and structured in an artistic way that is very different from the normal highs and lows we typically get from drum corps arrangements. Yes, a lot has changed since then with many new bells and whistles allowed. Many other corps have moved in different directions and have innovated in different ways. When it comes to modern drum corps as we see it today I think Star 1993 still holds up and it's clear to see how revolutionary it was back then. How do you think it holds up today? And I am not talking about scores or placements or who you think it would or would not beat. None of that. I'm thinking more from a visual/music/design/thematic perspective.
    1 point
  4. I didn’t see this show live on the field. However, it was what they did with it in 1994 while touring with The Canadian Brass that I did get to see it live. Both in its standstill version at Wolf Trap, and in the indoor drill version. Wolf Traps’ show will always be remembered, because I had front row to the show. Percussion played Marimba Spiritual, followed by Star coming out in uniform to perform a shortened but no less incredible version of their 91 and 93 show. The CD from their initial year with Canadian Brass is unfortunately one I lost somewhere in my travels and moves over the years. It has the recording of Marimba Spiritual, Medea, Pines of Rome / Villa Borghese, Pictures at an Exhibition, and a very good Everyone Loves the Blues (similar arrangement to early 80’s Blue Devils). I’d love find it and own it again, if anyone knows where to find it. The first CD of Brass Theater, if I remember correctly, had a light blue cover with a maple leaf in blue and orange, noting “ Brass Theater”. It also had a write up about Star of Indiana on the insert, explaining how they were discovered by the Canadian Brass and how Brass Theater evolved.
    1 point
  5. So this thread is sliding away from the initial focus of the CEO resigning. All the talk of tour, bands, regions, membership and so on means absolutely nothing until and unless SCV can get their org act together. A discussion of the org as it is currently constructed might lead to ideas for maybe how it should be constructed to support re-entry to World Class, Open Class, whatever. Who might lead SCV ? What’s the BOD composition? How might they raise money? If these elements aren’t fixed and fixed right away, there’s little chance we’ll see anything from SCV in 2024. The clock is ticking.
    1 point
  6. Which is something that has to be kept in mind when they talk about 'record attendance' at some of their events. They may have great attendance at the regionals/finals, but its still negative if fewer people overall are seeing shows because the number of those are a fraction of what they once were.
    1 point
  7. I think this is a great point. While Medea was wild, numerous corps have used it since. But Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celeste was so wild that it was dumb. It's still a ridiculous idea to program that piece, and the 30 years since have shown it. Nevertheless, it was magical.
    1 point
  8. While the advice of an accountant is important, it's also important to recognize that the marching members expect a much higher level of instruction now days compared to 20 years ago. That's the reason why the bulk of the staff on tour are professional educators, professional musicians or in some cases aspiring educators/musicians. Acquiring & retaining the services of those folks cost money, and drum corps honestly is paying out on the cheap to get them. There's actually been a push on multiple fronts for staff members to be paid MORE... not less. Members also expect to have a tech for their section present at all times. All of those professional staff mentioned above have commitments & obligations that they need to tend to outside of the corps, which is why the staff is stacked several layers deep to allow people to rotate on/off tour as needed. Gone are the days of only having one or two staff members on tour trying to cover an entire caption. It's also important to keep member safety in mind. Having someone on the full tour + spring training can lead to burn out. When people are burned out, they're more likely to mishandle or completely miss a critical incident where member safety is at risk. One last thing to keep in mind is that many corps now have full-time administrative staff (ex. CEO, director, etc...). That's going to chew up a fairly large portion of that staff expenditure percentage. You can argue whether it's necessary to have those full-time people in place, but reputable sources that the corps are being referred to use for guidance all suggest having that type of structure.
    1 point
  9. I hope this is allowed and that someone hasn't posted this recently...but suddenly the suggestion for what video to watch on youtube was Crown's 2013 finals night brass judge tape. It's been up for seven years and it just now suggested it for some reason even though I searched for it a lot. This is how the won that perfect brass score
    1 point
  10. When I presented the show to my kiddo for the first time (DCI DM), I specifically called their attention to the "weaponized silence," and how the arrangers used it as much as they did the notes on the page. They said that's the part that stuck with them. I think it's obviously an amazingly cleanly performed show. Star would have played the hell out of anything that summer. But it's also an extremely sophisticated design, more than what I think anyone had ever seen to that point. Had they been allowed the percussive freedom that we see from modern pits, it would have been even further afield from convention, I think. The lasting musical influence to me is that if a corps came out and played it mostly note for note, it would sound perfectly appropriate for what we see these days. Visually, they started pushing the boundaries of big unison body movement and capturing the full-field guard moment into the drill, I think. Wasn't quite the full on dance moveset we see now, but if you look at what Vanguard was doing in '98 and '99, you can recognize the influence straight off. I still listen to this show every so often - it holds up very well. Mike
    1 point
  11. Listening to Jeff explain the ideas of the show last year really shows how simple the show was. I think they performed the heck out of the show with what they were trying to do and I am looking forward to this season. Also thought it was interesting that he tries to incorporate a crown set within the theme of the show instead of just having it there. I still love seeing the traditional crown set, but Jeff is a master at what he does, so no complaints here haha. Hope everyone has been well. Go Crown!
    1 point
  12. [measures the back patio]
    1 point
  13. Ok so. 1) The thumbnail has a screen shot with one of those columns of fabric circled. I was half interested if he'd talk about how difficult those were to clean and if there was some sort of intention in not having them perfectly clean and if perhaps even the shape was not actually a rectangle of fabric given the swirly effect. But there's now mention of this part of the show in the video..wtf? I feel a bit clickbaited! 2) OH THE ORANGE THING IS AN INFINITY SYMBOL. How the heck did I not see this all season? I'm even more obsessed with it. 3) For all the flack the ballad cloth got, I still think it was super effective. Particularly on the pull out reveal. Here I note that it WAS an oval and not a circle. So the design here was not going for geometric perfection but more 'fabric in motion' effects.
    1 point
  14. like many at the time, i wasn't a fan. but when i got the recordings and started digging in, it started to grow on me. as i matured in the activity and all of the visual and musical pieces of the puzzle started coming together in my brain...like 5/6 years later....i realized it was a game changer. i'm still very ok with Cadets winning, but the design in Star was easily 15 years ahead of its time.
    1 point
  15. An X factor was that Jim Prime was not writing those other shows. He was expert at stretching boundaries without losing drum corps audiences. His work stands up so many years later.
    1 point
  16. It’s not the equipment. It’s the operator. You had some master operators in that horn line.
    1 point
  17. I'll approach it from one marching member's perspective from inside the 1993 Star hornline. To me, this show demonstrates many of the limits of what can be accomplished with G-bugles. The highest of highs, the lowest of lows, both in volume and in timbre. While other corps had already branched out into 3-valve instrumentation, we were still playing a full line of 2-valve K-series King bugles that were purchased by Bill Cook in 1984. The line was, with a small number of exceptions, made up of all of the original Kings from that purchase, meticulously maintained by Eric Lund. Jim Prime's arrangement of extremely difficult, sometimes almost inaccessible, source material was some of the best brass writing in the history of the activity. It was integrated with our percussion section and visual design because of professional collaboration at the highest level. We were only able to physically perform this show due to the extreme conditioning program that Jim Mason insisted on, and we only had to use three alternate performers to replace brass members, either injured or otherwise, before the end of the season. I have read lots of opinions of this program over the years, some better informed than others. It was a "revenge" show. It was "too highbrow." It was "not drum corps." I'm here to tell you that it was all of those things, and also so much more. It wasn't just another show and it never will be. Sometimes, I still can't believe that the series of events that led me to Bloomington in January of 1993 actually happened. I wouldn't trade the experience for anything. There will never be anything else like it.
    1 point
  18. Thanks for the kind words. We were all scrambling to get inside Sondheim's craft. The brass charts would have been pretty humble without Charlie Poole's percussion, Tom Lizotte's teaching skills and the visuals by Sylvester and Zingali. To be sure, that was a great group to scramble with. The show wasn't everyone's cup of tea, but neither is Sondheim. Here's the long-lost video: ...and if you'd like more back-story: https://marchingartseducation.com/1051-sondheim-on-a-football-field/
    1 point
This leaderboard is set to Chicago/GMT-05:00
×
×
  • Create New...