Ultimate_cab_fan

I marched with a guy who claimed to have marched with the Cavaliers. He would always say when I was with the Cavaliers we did this or did that. After a couple of years I asked him more about the Cavaliers and it turned out he marched in a parade corps called the Cavaliers. He always left out the parade part :P .

I vaguely remember Lee posting on here saying he was supposed to work with an east coast corps Last year or the year before. The details escape me, and I don't know how to do a search on DCP without going through all the threads. :(

Interesting... did it say in what capacity? Isnt it a conflict of interest? Unless, of course, he's working with a corps thats not in the top ten, or one competing "A" class.

Who's rocking the boat? Is this a Buccaneer reference? They going all Broadway? They going to take on the cabs with an all Latin show? Hurricane reference? Boat getting sucked into a storm induced ocean vortex while playing "Beyond the Sea"? Brigadiers? Reminiscent of the many Germans once in the corps, "Das Boat"? Is boat a clue?

Is there a new corps starting in the east? Is it the good corps from the east to counter the wicked corps from the west? Inquiring minds want to know. BTW...northern jersey already has too many to support with Skyliners, Bushwackers, Cabs, and Sun. Therefore if you're going to start one go out to Rhode Island. ^0^

I sense a conspiracy to take this thread off topic to get it banished to the OT Forum. ^0^ You people are evil, and are officially qualified to start an east coast version of the Renegades. I rather enjoy reading this topic and the different perspectives of the situation. Therefore...stop reading it and posting in it if you want to see the thread die.

Yea... I remember those days. When the interval was shoulder to shoulder and the tempo was at most 120 bpm while moving, and we stood still for 5 minutes for a concert number. No lines make pass thrus difficult at best and dangerous at worst; add in a tempo of 160 bpm with a wind driven rain in your eyes. I'm just glad there were no major injuries. I know some of you people go to these things just to see someone crash.

It would be nice if they traveled, but would it still be DCA if they did? How many of the northeast corps would still exist if they did? Money could be an excuse, but probably one of the reasons for so many corps existing in the north east is likely because it’s primarily a weekend activity up here. I would imagine a good number of marching members would drop out if they had to take off a couple of days a week every couple of weeks to travel to a show. The average member's age would probably drop drastically making the corps more like DCI. I'm betting the average member age of the north east corps is probably almost twice that of the non northeast corps. I have no real statistics, just pulling a number out of my butt as I look at the pictures of the various corps over the summer. Kudos to the corps that are able to travel. I imagine the reason you're able to get so many diehard members willing to travel is because you're the only game for miles. You have the members that will swim a mile and a half through s### just to perform one more time on the field. We get those members up here too, but not as many. They typically come from Canada, England, Germany, and Japan. I think the best bet is to build the shows in your own regions. Yank the judges from the northeast to out of region shows. I think the numbers would be close enough to gauge your relative performance to a northeastern corps. The scores would be as comparable to scores given in the northeast on the same night at two different venues. I'm torn. Boy I sure love watching drum corps. I love to see corps from other parts of the country, but Im too old and poor to travel too far to see it.

Do you mean this Erie show? Erie PA DCA Saturday July 16, 2005 Position Corps Score 1 Empire Statesmen 84.050 2 Syracuse Brigadiers 82.325 3 Rochester Crusaders 72.750 4 Kingston Grenadiers 71.213 5 Skyliners 70.500 6 White Sabers 64.888 7 Mon Valley Express 49.050 That was probably an 8 hour drive from NYC. I didn't go, but I heard it went on after the rain. I vaguely remember some of the posts on DCP of the corps that partied that night after the show; mostly from the Skyliners, Crusaders and the Thunderbirds. Wish I could have made that one. It sounded like a lot of fun.

WOW ! Lucid well thought out post. It's sad that the non-northeastern corps' don't have enough DCA sanctioned shows to allow them to stay closer to home. I know it's selfish of me, but I was so stoked that the Skyliners were able to have the Vets and Gold perform in Dover. Other than championships, it was the only other time I was able to see them, and my how well their shows developed between those viewings. I wouldn't travel to another region to view a show, but I'm sure there are fans in other regions who would love to see some of the northeastern corps'.

Call me old, but I miss allentown. All the corps rehearsed in beautiful parks, and it seemed like there was water running through each of them. We loved going to Dorney park the day before championships. Then off to Reading's clap show. You could feel the excitement as we'd walk through cedar creek park watching the various corps' warming up. We took breaks to feed the ducks. MMMMM pierogies and hot dogs with a beer at the stadium.... I can smell them now.... sigh.... That was when both prelims and championships were held on the same day. Almost forgot.... breakfast at Dempseys. Just around the corner from the stadium. I wonder if that's still around.

Yea that's some of it, but I also think it's about getting the vote, and most importantly, I think member corps get a specific dollar amount per show they do. If you're not a member, you get whatever the show sponsor wants to give you. I'm sure there's a lot more, but without the secret rule book and magic decoder ring I can only go by hearsay.

Wow! thats cool. Now if we could just get G. W. Bush to do the same.

I heard that Ed Bopp, Staff Coordinator for the Skyliners, is in the hospital with pneumonia. Apparently, he spent that Saturday rehearsing all day in the rain. Did anyone else get sick after that weekend? Get well Ed!

Jeff, I agree with you. That's why it has to be an equitable solution for all. I believe most of all the reason corps' didn't pull out of prelims was because of the money. I'm sure in the secret DCA rule book somewhere there's something that says if you don't participate in championships you don't get a cut of the pie. Or... I'm sure there's some political penalty to be reserved for future participation equal or worse to "double secret probation". I want it to work. In fact need it to work, because, at risk of peril to my marriage, I enjoy the activity way too much to see it wither away.

If you don't want it to work, it wont. If you do want it to work, you'll figure it out. If you have no interest in figuring it out, then you're not the man for the job.

Oh yea, I forgot to mention my idea on that one. The finals tickets that were sold for the event take precedence. A prelims ticket holder will trade in their ticket for a credit to be applied towards a seat at the event, ( it may be general admission), or they receive a partial credit for the next years championships. And to make it more palatable, you could give those ticket holders preferential treatment by offering them a special limited time pre-sale to obtain premium seating. Sure there are probably lots of problems with this, but I bet we could each add something to improve this to make it more equitable without giving away the farm.

No need to hide it Jeff. I think that attitude is more prevalent than we care to admit. Hiding it in the closet won't make it better. Yes... it makes us uncomfortable to see it. If it's to get fixed, it has to be out in the open. We have to care about all the corps. Let’s be less condescending to the non-finalist corps and be real.

You're right Jeff. Something had to give, and I believe that should have been finals. I propose in the case we had on Saturday that there be no separate prelims and finals event. All 23 corps play in the one show, just like you would have had in prelims. That's it. As for notifying people of the change: put up sandwich boards at the prelims event informing people of the change. (we're a fairy tight nit family - the information would have filtered through the grape vine easily enough) Make an announcement on a local radio station (information could be sent out with tickets about which stations to listen to for news of the weekend events) On the next day, start the show early enough so that at the regular finals show start time the 14th seeded corps goes on (thinking is if someone misses the communicae of changes they'll still see finals as they were expecting because they'll be arriving at the normal start time) As for the stadium crew recovering before events, come one now... I've seen larger high school stadiums recover in less time. Lets face it, if the crew can't get it done, then they are understaffed for the event. I don't have all the answers, but I am open to making changes for the benefit of all the corps. I especially don't want to see corps who didn't make the top ten suffer next year because of what happened at finals this year.

OMG... could you blame them for not chiming up? If they complained on here they'd be labeled as WHINERS or worse yet, SORE LOOSERS. Please... do we have to state the obvious? We don't need their corps disparaged because a few of you "F..I..N..A..L..I..S..T" corps personnel are more than happy to label them as such. in fact... it seems to be the first things spilling out of your brains. Like the comment, " your corps sucked and couldn't make finals". CLASSIC .... Or how about the comment " with a whining member like you, no wonder your corps isn't good enough to make finals.." (sent to me in a pvt msg) real nice... come on kids, we could make this better for everybody; If we want it.

Im not sure what to make of this post. You're glad YOU got a warm up in the venue because you knew YOU were going to get into finals. It didnt matter how many fans were in the stands during prelims because knew YOU'd have a full house at finals. And yes, after watching the miserable prelims performances I got to see finals the very next day in the nice weather. What we're missing here are the other 11 corps who didn't get that opportunity; most of which I only had the one chance to see. You remember those guys: Kilties; Crusaders; Music City Legend; Frontier; Skyliners; Sunrisers; Chops, Inc; Lakeshoremen; Alliance; Gulf Coast Sound? Or perhaps they just don't matter, because everyone came to see YOU. Being a long time drum corps supporter IT MATTERS TO ME. Some of you kids just can't appreciate what it means to those corps that didn't make finals, because its all about YOU. Perhaps you joined a corps because you knew that corps would be a finalist, or you may be that person that hops from one corps to the next just to make sure you're in finals. Its not about YOU; it's about everyone. I can only hope for the best next year for those corps' that didn't get to perform in the good weather. I'm hoping that some of the rookies in those corps are not discouraged from continuing on with their corps'. I hope they don't look for greener pastures in an already made top ten corps. I hope they're able to come back next year as strong as they were this year if not stronger and perhaps be strong enough to knock someone else out of finals. Maybe that would be YOU. It would suck wouldn't it? Perhaps its just one of those lessons we learn as an adult; not in age but emotional maturity. To all the members of the Kilties; Crusaders, Music City Legend, Frontier, Skyliners, Sunrisers, Chops Inc, Lakeshoremen, Alliance and Gulf Coast Sound, I love what you folks are doing. Stick it out and make your programs stronger, because you all are the reason I buy a prelims ticket; I have no need to see the top ten finalists twice. If it weren't for you, I would just buy the finals ticket.

If they don't want it to work, then it won't. If they do want it to work, they'll figure it out. Maybe we have the wrong DCA guys in charge. Give me the DCA guys of the early 70's, the lefty mayers, the vince brunis, the costellos; the ones that took the leap to break away from the legion. The one's that paved the way for DCI to make the big break making it the success it is today. I need out of the box thinkers. The guys willing to take the chances, the guys not affraid to make waves. That's the attitude that can make anything happen; the attitude that created DCA. And for the love of GOD, please stop telling me how glad you were to suck it up and perform in that crap, because it has nothing to do with making things better; that's status quo thinking. As a paying fan I want to see changes for the better; NOT, it is what it is and we aint gonna change it cause it aint broke, cause if you were a real fan you would have stuck it out in the rain like the marching members... bla bla bla... yadda yadda yadda.... crap . That attitude will beget less paying fans in the stands.

If you don't want it to work, it won't. If you want it to work, you'll figure it out. I'm not asking for a dome. I just wanted what I paid for; to watch all the corps perform at their best. To see them have fun. Watching some of them on the field was equivalent to getting them drunk and saying go play a show for me, while I sit back with my friends watching and waiting for the inevitable wreck to happen. Saturday should have been cancelled plain and simple. It should have been one big event on Sunday. For those of you who say the weather for Sunday was predicted to be just as bad, I say it don’t matter. The fact is on Saturday they knew what they had to deal with, unbearable wind gusts and cold driving rain. They should have held out for Sunday hoping for a better day. And if that better day didn't happen, it would have been ok to make the decision to go on in despite the weather.

Didn't you spend some of that time under the cover of the luxury boxes? I thought I read that in another thread somewhere.

I was thinking the same thing as I read Jeff's post