Hup234

The empathy on this list concerning the unfortunate travails this unit is experiencing is understandable given its visibility within the few competitive units remaining today. Forty years ago, with perhaps 500 corps in North America at the time, the troubles of one corps would have hardly raised an eyebrow amongst all the others, one negative characteristic of the Golden Age.

Or the remaining smaller, struggling units could just quit banging their collective heads against the glass ceiling and organize together like a reverse-Combine/DCI, and go back to copying the successful format that worked so well in the Golden Age: community-based drum and bugle corps doing showy, crowd-pleasing music and drill with inexpensive instruments that are easy to learn to play.

I don't attend now, and I don't know anyone who does, but outside of the Oscars, Emmys, Tonys and Grammys and the like, entertainment isn't judged anyway. Then there's the success of Blast and things like flag-throwing pageantry and stand-alone drumlines. And, hey, without everyone trying so hard to play up to and impress high-priced judges with all that boring, arty Ingmar Bergman-style pseudo-intellectual pablum your writers have been forcing down everyone's throat, the activity could even reverse its long decline.

I say: go for it, and throw in banjos, kazoos, bagpipes, sarrusophones and ophicleides too. Why stop after adding just woodwinds? At this stage of evolution it hardly matters, as potential objections from any still-remaining purists will be your least worry. I have to wonder, though, when they're going to quit capitalizing off the drum corps/drum and bugle corps franchise, selling tickets to people thinking that's what they're going to see, and call the activity something like "pageantry", maybe, or "field band", and quit the roundabout Elvis-impersonator stuff.

Thank you, but with all respect, Mr. Boo, I have no love what passes for drum corps today. We are, perhaps, united in a manner of speaking by our abilities in expressing oppositional views, and I likewise encourage you to continue writing as well, as respectful contradiction is yet another thing that makes America great. Illegitimus non carborundum.

M. Boo has his opinions, and your reasons for objecting to Mr. Boo's writings are not clear to me, as Mr. Boo has long been a strong, vocal advocate for the activity as it has become. In contrast, I and a handful of others like to write about things that Mr. Boo contradicts, things like the accelerating deterioration of the activity, the shrinking of its numbers of participants, the weakening of its crowd appeal, its New Elitism and resultant exclusion of non-entitled youth, its overpriced staffers and equipment, its pack-mentality and its many yes-men who have managed by their silence to allow the few to dictate the activity's direction, which I see as a nonreversible death spiral at this point, should nothing change.

Regarding the current concern about recent disbandings: The bulk of the mass-disbandings took place thirty to forty years ago when the activity was hijacked by the money-driven artistes who though their Machiavellian politicizing and coincidental defeatism among the remaining units forced them to buy incredibly-expensive equipment, pay living wages to instructors, raise competition budgets through the roof (which killed off most of the local contests and forced ever-more-distant travel to be able to compete. What's happening now is end-stage. "Another poster made mention of people watching corps in the lot and not seeing the smaller groups. We NEED to support the little guys that struggle every year. We are each responsible in a small, indirect way for not helping these guys out." The public cannot be blamed for what they do/don't want to see, and the smaller units all feel they must do world-class-type shows - albeit scaled-down - to be able to participate, and in honesty those shows can at times painful to sit through, and the participants know it, which doesn't help their morale. "I say we start a massive fund-raising drive to help get the corps back on their feet by donating to them. It seems that corporate structure is not an issue, but money is." Money is an issue, but that lack of money stems from overpaid staff, overpriced equipment, and the diminishing appeal of the smaller units. And what nobody seems to be able to grasp is that there's a very finite number of what the artistes have managed over the recent decades to base the entire concept of the reinvented-away-from-rookies activity around: musically-experienced youth with money, time and interest.

"1- Change the model. Country wide touring is killing the activity. Go regional. 1B Change the pay rate. Everyone gets the same amount for each show." That was possible in the '70s but there are not enough units anymore. The DCI model has allowed 90% of the Golden Age corps to vanish. "2- Reduce the cost of starting a corps." Right, as seen during the Golden Age; start small and build from there. Been saying that for years, but the current leadership artistes would never go for anything less than a champagne budget for their molto expensivo instrumentations and matching salaries. There could be two co-existing structures: Golden Age and New Order, like Vintage Baseball with its 19th Century rules and uniforms. But I don't see elitist-DCI allowing that. "3- Advertise, advertise, advertise. Stop preaching to the choirs." With diminishing numbers each year that's growing more difficult, and the activity now is designed to appeal not to the audience but to whatever will please the crew of in-group artiste judges for that almighty score. The audience (likewise diminishing) has become only a necessary evil to pay salaries. "4- Expand the circuit." Can't. Too many corps have folded. Unless the current elitist system is thrown out, and that won't happen with the follower-mentality now prevalent. "5- The power needs to be taken out the corps hands and given to an independent authority." Exactly. That's what existed before the Combine/DCI artiste usurpers took over forty years ago, and it worked well. Of course, the current regime won't ever relinquish its control to any such group; they're the heirs of the usurpers who hijacked the activity away from the independent leadership of that time. The great American activity of Drum Corps is terminal, though too many of its participants still can't or won't count the numbers. Oh, there'll probably be some remnant left over, maybe a circuit of 8-10 super-corps, but it's too late to halt the inevitable. The will just isn't there. It's like the Pete Seeger song: "We're knee-deep in the Big Muddy, and the Big Fool says to push on."

In 1970 there were perhaps 500 or so corps in North America. Some say the number was even higher. Dozens of corps, many of them solid mainstays, folded within 24 months after the start of Midwest Combine/DCI. Few seemed to notice; fewer still seemed to care. True story: the Midwest Combine leadership's open-secret catchall appellation for any unit not in its circle was "crap corps". Since then the attrition rate never slackened. To the contrary, it intensified, and still there were no real leadership moves to address the root causes; it was just business-as-usual. And now, in July, 2012, with maybe what, two-and-a-half dozen competitors remaining, suddenly the latest failures of two lesser-ranked units have finally sounded alarm bells within what's left of the activity a full forty years after the first signs of systemic trouble and the origins of the death-spiral.

Of course the activity is dying, and it's probably terminal at this stage because your pretentious, pedantic leadership refuses to acknowledge the root causes of the long decline, which accelerated at the point when only trained musicians could join, after successful auditions for which fees were charged. And still, the fantasy of "serving the youth of America" keeps being harped on as though American youth were all wealthy, educated, artistic kids who needed yet another thing to do in the summer. And then there's the disregard and even open mockery directed at the pioneers of the activity. There's the ongoing demasculinization of musical and marching styles, even in the uniforms. Drum corps used to be all John Wayne and Lee Marvin; now it's Elton John and Marvin Hamlisch. Think of the NFL doing ballet halftime shows. And while I'm on the topic: There's the boring music your artiste arrangers think they have to write, which pleases ever-fewer audience members who want entertainment, not phony highbrow posturing. There's the loss of the former hometown-corps experience with all its related cohesiveness. The activity once enjoyed 500-plus corps comprised of average everyday kids, many of whom probably needed the activity much more than today's participants do. You're down to what, 33 or so now? And the two recent failures are naturally topics of major concern, aren't they? Understandable, but where was the concern when those other 470-plus long-ago corps failed and disappeared forever?[/b

Oh, gosh, horror of horrors. Why didn't you add "You're In the Army Now" without the benefit of five marimbas as well? But thanks for proving my oft-stated point ... that yours seems to be the only competitive activity that continually and openly diminishes, demeans, even mocks its own history and those who built it. Me, I'm only here to return the favor. What the heck, right? Yeah, exaggeration's fun, but when I say that your total roster of 2012 participant units is now down to about thirty-five in all, or about 1/20th of the "Ghost Riders in the Sky" (Casper, right, but Sousa was considered passe then, probably to our discredit), are there any corrections? And anyone want to talk about 2013, 2016, or ... ?

~~~~~~ During the '60s Golden Age, no Corps depended one smidgen on the VFW, AL, PAL or CYO in 1969 anyway, beyond those groups' sponsorship of their nationals and, in the cases of the VFW and AL, rulemaking. That's an overblown myth promulgated by the excusemakers in the Midwest Combine and its successor DCI to justify their being. In 1969 there were easily twenty times the Corps than there are "corps" now. But in reality, since the veterans of the Golden Age rarely monitor the activity any more, you have only my word for all of that and many more who believe that "VFW/AL" myth here than there are those like myself who still care to discredit it. Believe what you wish.

The decades-long death-spiral of D&BC began in the early 1970s when its somewhat-flawed but working national structure was usurped by what I call the artistes within the activity. They professed an elitist policy from the start designed to favor themselves and those who they'd privately already determined would fit into their Brave New World ... which began to deconstruct almost immediately. Of the 500-to-900 corps then active (estimates vary), within eight years the number was halved, then halved again in three years. The new national leadership responded by making it even more difficult and expensive to compete, and even more elitist by deeming the rookie kids who made up the lifeblood of D&BC irrelevant so that "D&BC" (they kept the name) now sought only experienced (read "monied") talent. And to cap off their victory (I struggled hard to avoid using quotes around that word) the new leadership has always dismissed the half-century pre-DCI history and its participants as though it and they were from some unenlightened Dark Age. And that mindset is totally unlike every other competitive activity, each of which celebrates its past. Actually, this website discusses the activity, whether promotional, critical or noncommittal. Only you can balance the determining factors on that.

Of course it isn't worth it, and those who continue to soldier on each year espousing their novus ordo goal of Broadway-on-the-field still don't get it. There just aren't that many affluent budding musical/dance geniuses out there ready to discover what's still called "drum and bugle corps" and deciding to spend their teen years in it. Your leaders are blind to that reality, but far worse, blind to the disenfranchisement and exclusion of all the millions of youth who could and did benefit from drum corps before the wannabe-Bob Fosse-types usurped the activity thirty years ago and redesigned it to appeal to the most-moneyed and best-educated teens who need yet another activity like Imelda Marcos needed another pair of shoes. While they're digging around seeking far-flung instant talent who they don't have to spend time training, they overlook the nearby neighborhood diamonds-in-the-rough, the original foundations of drum corps' Golden Age, poor untrained kids like Mel Torme, Fred Waring and Les Elgart and so many more who became superstars because of drum corps, or the original intent of drum corps anyway. So if you're panning for gold but ignoring all the little tiny nuggets hoping for that really big score you think/heard might be out there, the call is yours whether your system is worth it to you or not.

Permit me to contend otherwise by pointing out that "back then" the activity was flourishing; one only needs to count the numbers. The product being put out today, rings or no rings, is boring to the general public and to potential new recruits.

Common usage of the term refers to a body of musicians marching while playing drums and one other instrument, i.e. bugles, fifes or bagpipes. (Confusion as to the term's actual definition has proliferated since the 1980s when the term was (in)appropriated by brass bands using neither bugles, fifes or bagpipes, a la the beverages called "Long Island ice teas" which contain no tea and "egg creams", which contain neither eggs nor cream.) However, when capitalized and punctuated as Drum Corps!, the term generally refers to a once-popular but now archaic, antediluvian and nearly-vanished North American activity that throughout most of the 20th Century until about 1980 was widespread and well-attended by both participants and spectators in numerous parade and field events. In its heyday perhaps five thousand youths and adults (called "members"), many with no previous experience, would be encouraged to participate in Drum Corps! each year after learning rudiments of marching and musicianship using basic, affordable instruments with which their talents could be developed. Despite the use of limited instrumentation, the musical product of Drum Corps! was quite elaborate although the audio-visual technology of the era prohibited the recording of complete performances and therefore artifacts of Drum Corps!, except for sound recordings, are unfortunately nearly nonexistent.

'MikeD' wrote: "Where are the corps to join this new association?" The implication was that the smaller, struggling units should take control of their own destiny. By readopting the basic, easy and proven-successful All-American D&BC Assn. rules rather than trying to match the DCI system of impossibly-expensive and complex programs with few resources, local membership should increase exponentially with inexperienced, trainable area recruits. "No such thing. Ticks were just as subjective as today's system...maybe even more so. Was the event a tick or not? Did the event deserve a group error? If so, how many tenths?" That's not so. The tick system, while far from perfect, registered errors, except in the one opinion class of General Effect. Today, it's all opinion right across the board. 4. Allow all G bugles, from open to three-valve, to allow for inexperienced recruits to more quickly learn and for more experienced players to continue being challenged. "Those horns are allowed in DCI...why ANY corps would want to use them would be the issue, IMO." Please re-read the paragraph. I said that the whole point of G bugles is that it is easy to learn to play them and because of that, to recruit new and inexperienced members. In addition, they are far less expensive to buy.

Daniel, the term refers to the 1920-1980 period of greatest participation (some estimates say as many as 1,000 corps were active) with numerous nearby contests each weekend and maximum audience attendance. Thanks for your interest.

Jim, those who have abandoned the activity since the end of the Golden Age don't bother to post in this forum. I'm an exception, perhaps the only one. Too bad, because input from outsiders should always be sought, and not just here. The leadership has excised out all the excitement that was the Golden Age corps' main stock in trade. Unlike the Golden Age, the shows now have no beginnings and no ends and therefore are unsatisfying. They may be precise, well-executed, oh-so-musical and what-all, but they are boring - bo-ring - except of course to the effete artistes in charge now who dictate policy and who aren't about to retrench despite the lessons of the past three decades with its horrendous erosion within the activity they are allowed to govern. A couple of quotes to illustrate: "This is a picture that starts in the middle for the benefit of those who come in in the middle." (Danny Kaye) "We're knee-deep in the Big Muddy, and the Big Fool says to push on." (Pete Seeger)

Ah, yes, how to save drum corps. SOSDD, faithful readers. Back in 2000 when the ominous signs of trouble ahead began to raise concerns, I posted the following pearls of my wisdom/experience on the old Usenet discussion group. I actually expected (naive, wasn't I?) to inspire some discussion amongst the activity's deep thinkers. I thought I'd made some good points. Basically though, there was just grumbling from DCI True Believers who (not getting it as usual) took what I said about struggling little units as "an insult on the chilllldrenn." Now that the topic's come up A-gain, here it is again, though the freethinking crusader-types -- there still were some around in 2000 who might have carried the torch -- have long since given up the ghost and are gone for good. Anyways: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From 2000: The Strategy to Save Drum Corps Some of you would remember me from the late '50s into the early '70s. Though I was never a major figure in drum corps, my main corps did place in the Top Ten twice. I started two corps which became regionally prominent until rising costs brought a swift end (and a merciful end, we know now, had we blindly and naively continued into the DCI maelstrom that was just beginning then). I saw the great contests and the thousands of cheering fans and the wonderful synergy that drum corps used to be. I witnessed many corps start from scratch, and become great. (How comparatively easy it was to do then.) The Chicago (then Cicero) Royal Airs, the LaCrosse Blue Stars, the Dubuque Colt .45, the Rockford Phantom Regiment rebirth and so many more. But all the corps were good, even the little hometown corps that were starting everywhere. They were all entertaining, and all the corps supported all the other corps. It's just something we did. It was a big Club that we all were proud as hell to say we belonged to. If we had a fatal flaw, it's that we were mostly naive. Gullible. When some of the more prestigious corps people proposed a national association in 1970, to be made up of "all drum corps people and free of those out-of-it veterans' groups that try to dictate corps policies" (and that's how it was sold to us), it did sound promising. The bright shining promise of equality. Except, as we found out far too late, that some corps bigwigs had decided how to make some corps a little more equal. (A great read: George Orwell's "Animal Farm".) Here's my proposal. And if it doesn't happen, drum corps won't really die. It'll just continue as it is, with a few top corps in what's left of the limelight, and a scattering of pathetic, stumbling little "zombie" corps that are nearer death than life. 1. Do nothing about DCI. Let them continue as is, with their system intact and unthreatened. (In other words, give them the chance to live that they never gave us.) 2. Start a new association immediately, based on the proven American Legion/All-American system that saw the flourishing of the drum corps Golden Age until 1970. Use a name and operating policy that's non-threatening to DCI; we don't need an overt, ongoing battle with them (although there's no law against secretly gloating when our contests and our corps outdraw and outnumber theirs). 3. Reinstate the objective tick-system of judging. This greatly controls corruption and politics within the current "opinion-based" judging. 4. Allow all G bugles, from open to three-valve, to allow for inexperienced recruits to more quickly learn and for more experienced players to continue being challenged. If you agree, here's what to do: Start talking it up via this forum, via telephone and e-mails, and through continued personal contact. Form a loose-knit steering committee to plan a fall meeting in, say, Indianapolis, the traditional spot for drum corps rulemaking. Then attend, and volunteer! And bring drum corps back to its rightful prominence as the magnificent youth activity that it once was.

What gives!! A good illustration: play any Golden Age (say, pre-1980) recording and hear how the D&B Corps were rousing the big crowds of the day (right before the effete artistes took over and started calling themselves "faculty".) Here, look at it this way: Compare for a moment this activity to movies, with the D&BC Golden Age being 'Star Wars' and today's New Order being, say, 'The English Patient'. Which one turned us on and sent us home humming? I wouldn't blame the folks in the stands. Even the parents seem bored.

The word "challenge" isn't really fitting in this instance, as the implication of challenge usually refers to overcoming difficulties on the path towards an eventual favorable conclusion, and that, after looking at trends within the current activity, seems to be ever more elusive each year. As to the three ... problems? barriers? ... I'd put the activity's total failure in attracting and training green, trainable and loyal local-area rookies to the activity as No. 1. No. 2 would be the unapologetic scorn and even mockery leveled towards the activity's history and its participants, so fashionable among its current participants. No. 3 would be the activity's stubborn reluctance and unwillingness to change policy in the face of its drastic decline in sheer numbers since the 1970s, and worse, its proclivity to blame everything except the activity itself.

Numbers always tell when people won't. The public votes with its presence/absence and its wallets. And when they continue to stay away, when they don't buy certain cars or toothpaste . . . or when attendance falls over time at certain types of movies (or at outdoor pageantry events), or when general membership numbers continue to drop over the years in organizations such as the Elks, Moose and Eagles (or in drum corps), smart promoters discuss changing the formula.

Not at all. Okay, I'll illustrate Golden Age of Drum Corps in a different way. Consider the term Golden Age of Hollywood, universally accepted to refer to the era before all the movie industry's technological advances now commonplace such as nearly-universal color photography, stereophonic multi-channel sound, computer-generated animation, three-dimensional projection, even reclining theatre seats and trans-fat-free popcorn. The Golden Age of Radio ended long before stereo FM, traffic reports, instant news, "Top Forty", solid-state electronics, Ipods, satellites and all the rest. The Golden Age of Television was live and unedited on two or three black-and-white channels that signed off at 11 pm. I discount technology as a meaningful influence on what makes an era especially meaningful.

One major sports/D&BC difference is that baseball and other competitive sports have never made entry-level participation difficult, and that's why this particular activity's numbers have been slipping for decades. With all the many hundreds of Golden Age corps, there was always a welcome out for rookies, even in the Top Ten. Auditions took place only when one asked to upgrade into another section. Resumes were requested from instructors, not members. Salaries were low (and usually nonexistent for management) to hold participation costs down. And etcetera and so forth, and the beat goes on - but for how long at this rate is anyone's guess.