davidp

Chattahoochee Vanguard is still an army of one, not meeting the minimum requirements of either MCA or DCA, and thus will not be performing or competing in 2010 (unless, of course, the numbers pick up ).

Still here... I'm well aware of the "Catch-22" situation; gotta have a corps for people to want to join, but then you gotta have people in order to have a corps. I'll announce an organizational meeting/open house if/when there is some interest. A couple of trumpets, a bari or euph or two, and maybe a tuba is all it would take to get started. I have both a Bb and an F marching french horn (I'll play whichever sounds better), so 5 or 6 to start would be fine. I have some brass quintet music that we could start with as well. Again, PM me here if you're interested. I'll get back to you, I assure you. :) Thanks.

I think Canton would be as good as "just right" as you could get. It's more or less central to everybody, or so it seems.

He left out the part about the bassoon-bari sax duet, that sounds more like dueling electric razors.

Hopefully, there will be at least 14 mini corps in the near future. I usually post on the all-Age forum, but this caught my eye. I'm attempting to start a mini corps for the west Atlanta/north Georgia area. Right now, I'm an army of one. Anybody interested can PM me here. Thanks! Sorry to be a thread-jacker.

Still hopeful...

Just wanted to bring this back to the front, in case somebody missed it.

Thanks!

Doh! Sorry to bring this up so close to Finals.

I haven't gone anywhere, there have just been some other things getting the way (like getting married, moving (again), etc.). I'm still interested in forming a mini-corps in the North Georgia area. If anyone from the Atlanta area, Northern or Western Georgia, Eastern Alabama, or Southern Tennessee (or anywhere else if you like to drive a lot ), is interested in something like this, please PM me here. I don't want to take anyone away from a corps they might be in now, unless, of course, you want to do this (just don't want there to be any bad blood/hard feelings). We'd need to have an organizational meeting first, of course, to see if it's even doable. I'd like to start out with at least enough committed members to play some tunes (8-10 horns and at least one drummer). If needed or desired, we can start out with brass choir stuff (or if you have some charts, please bring 'em! :) ), and then morph into pure drum corps. Just thought I'd run this up the flagpole, and see who salutes it. :) Thanks for reading this. davidp

I never marched corps, but have been a fan for years. I think part of it is because in the old days, there were band people who marched in drum corps, but a lot of drum corps people did not march or play in bands. There was a lot less crossover then than now. Drum corps was seen more as a youth activity than a music education experience, and there was a sort of separation between the two. A lot of kids who marched in corps didn't even read music; they learned by rote. Some band directors even forbade their kids from marching corps, from what I have heard and read.

So, do the Bb Frenchies still have the same length of tubing as Bb Baritones? Also, aren't most F Frenchies basically mellophones which french horn leadpipes? I have both Bb and F marching french horns one by King (Bb), and the other is a DEG (F). The F horn looks a lot like a mello, but with less tubing, and I can play just as high (just about, anyway). Not trying to "stir the puddin'," just asking. :)

I'd like to see somebody do Petruska again. Heck, if I could arrange music, I'd arrange it myself. Oh well.

A group I helped start already does that (well, no keyboards/amps); we have woodwinds (a killer sax player), singers, etc. Of course, we're a community band, and we don't march, either. We've been Hoppy's idea of DCI/DCA since 2002 (except for the marching). But you'll never see us at Rochester, unless some of us go to see the drum corps.

I have an old DEG (marching F horn). The Kanstul looks sweet. I'll not go back to mellophone if i can help it; don't want to screw up my horn chops. What does a Kanstul run nowadays? I can never find a price.

Probably everybody and all of their brothers.

Chris is now Principal trumpet for the Chicago Symphony! I remember him as a 4-5 year old kid moving from lap to lap on our bus on a band trip to Virginia. Dang, I'm old!!!!!

Wow, I feel for you, man. I know personally two people who have that, or something like it (my horn teacher and a cousin by marriage), and I've seen what it can do to a person. Fibromyalgia (as well as lupus and mixed connective tissue disorder) is bad stuff.

Off topic, sort of; I forget what year it was, but either college football or the USFL (or somebody) was experimenting with raised hash marks. There is a classic video clip of one of the line judges running in toward the center of the field, when he actually does trip on the hash mark, and falls flat on his face. Yes, I remember stuff like that, but really important stuff? No way.

How bout this; if a Class A corps scores high enough to place in the top ten, why not just announce their score in that interval, but also announce them as Class A champion? Like this: "In sixth place, with a score of 90.752431680, the Class A Champion, the Perspiration Cadets!" Or something like that.

I like it.

Good points.

Yeah, but what about the corps who have more than 21, but less than 35, especially those who want to march? That's what I'm talking about. MCA is great, and I hope my group will soon be a member, but if I was part of a corps that wanted to compete on the field, MCA would only work until we got the "marchin' jones," unless there's more to MCA that I don't know about. I'm thinking that an A-35 class corps could do their shows on a basketball court-sized field/area (indoors or out), like SDCA, and be entertaining in that venue.

Somebody beat me to mentioning Columbus, OH, but what about Akron or Canton? Chicago would be great as well, as would Baltimore.

Has there been any thought about creating an A-35 class association-wide, that would allow corps under 35 members to have their own deal? They wouldn't have to attend the big shows, but could have their own, and even do indoor shows. That way, they could get the benefit of competition, and continue to work their way up to Class A and Open Class, if that's what they want. I think DCA might find that there might be a market for it, and they might get more corps involved, if they know there's an arena for them while they're still growing. It may even get more corps up and going. It's just a thought, and probably needs a lot more development.