Orpheus
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Posts posted by Orpheus
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IMO, 1986 is tops for sure.
1999 is a close second.
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I think the Bluecoats new uniforms go well with them this year Dark and evil and just absolutely playing the snot of their show! BLOOOO!!!!!
Yeah, they do ... but they still look too much like BD. B)
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To me this doesn't sound like the contest was "fixed" - where there was some conspiracy to determine the outcome. It doesn't even necessarily sound like an example of "slotting" where corps always get the same ordinal position as their overall ranking. Instead, it sounds like an insecure judge who wanted context of prior scores before awarding his own. DCI discourages this, but some band circuits (and WGI, I believe) explicitly encourage judges to study recent scores for groups that they will be adjudicating.
Gosh. Look at you trying to, like, bring the truth into this discussion. Shame on you.
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Wow. Congrats, Bluecoats.
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Now, see ... those are a little bit *TOO* bland. LOL There's a happy medium somewhere. I got a great "property of" shirt from Spirit, for instance.
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Maybe if no one died fighting under that flag so you could have the freedom to do what you want to do and say what you want to say it would be a silly constuct.
Here's the question -- were they fighting for the flag (which is, after all, just a pretty piece of cloth) ... or were they fighting for the freedoms that it represents, such as those outlined in the Bill of Rights? For the record, BTW, there's an American flag flying from my front porch on every holiday and I always observe proper flag etiquette to the best of my knowledge. However, I also realize that this country is about more than that. We shouldn't treat the flag like some sort of bizarre religious icon. Rather, we should love and cherish the liberties that it is supposed to stand for. I would never deface an American flag as a form of protest, for instance, but I firmly believe that it would be unconstitutional and un-American for the government to punish someone who did.
And God help all of us if we lose that freedom paid for in blood. For DC will be the very least of things we will lose.What's really ironic, though, is that some of the politicians who are most likely to drape themselves in the red, white, and blue are also the ones who seem to be doing the most to limit certain of our freedoms.
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
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No it's not. I think I know what he's doing.
Care to elaborate?
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So as life goes on the questions have to be answered. In the 70's Kilties went from powerhouse to almost a memory, I always wondered if it was more a cultural thing in that there wasn't enuff bodies to march 3 DCI competitive All Male Corps, as was the disappearance of all-girl corps. So now are we seeing the same thing in there aren't enuff "quality" bodies to maintain 2 top 12 all-male corps?
I hardly think that lack of quality members is the Scouts' major issue.
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Goo d to hear. :)
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I'll tell you what I like, and it annoys me that some corps don't even seem to sell them anymore -- an ordinary t-shirt (in white, grey, or a single solid color) with just the corps name and logo or else a nice basic-looking "tour" shirt. Some of the shirts that some corps sell are so elaborate that they're just ridiculous. Maybe that's what sells, but personally I don't want photos of guys drumming, cute or inspirational sayings, or anything of that nature. I like the plain ol' "property of Spirit drum & bugle corps" with the delta logo that I picked up this summer. Nice and simple.
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No problem. Wondering = caring, right?
I'm actually concerned about the corps members. I mean, I have absolutely no idea if the rumor is true (I sure hope it's not) but you know what I mean, right? Dicey situation for the young men in the corps, if something like this were to happen.
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That would be correct.
The rituals.....there are schools around here where they still do the Pledge....believe me when I first ran into that, it shocked me because this was in Madison. However, due to the political correctness crap of the day, kids didn't have to stand and recite it if they didn't want to. Talk about cringing with smoke coming out of my ears. Of course no one can say that they're wrong to just sit there, unless you want to be accused of the horrible crime of imposing Americanism and Christianity on the kids by making them stand with hand over heart.
So allowing kids the rights guaranteed them by the First Amendment is a horrible crime?
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I've never had one favorite corps. There's some I tend to like better than others, but it all depends on how I feel about their show during the year in question. I think the "borg" types who root for one particular corps are in the minority.
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So, would drum corps be better off if DCI was never created?
If "DCI" hadn't been created (or had flopped early on), then something very similar would have had to have come along very soon thereafter or else drum corps would likely have withered and died. Lord knows that the VFW, American Legion, and CYO weren't really all that interested in devoting a lot of their resources toward the activity by '72. Don't forget that DCA came first, after all, and DCI was sort of following in their footsteps.
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It sounds like marching band began gaining in popularity roughly equivalent to DC's long-term recession. I mean, DC used to be locally based and you learned to play your axe in the corps. Drums, brass, whatever. MB's and band programs in general sound like they came into the mainstream roughly equivalent to the same time that DC's began to decline, for the opposite reasons. Where MB's are generally school-specific and basically taxpayer-supported, DC's are individually-supported, etc and have no tax support from a community, etc.Thanks.
No, I think you're right on target. That's not the only factor, of course, but I think it's a big part of it. I mean, the small local "community" corps basically doesn't exist anymore. And largely, it seems that what they used to provide to a community is now provided by the local school bands. I mean, in the old days, there were corps that were (more-or-less) "mom and pop" type operations. That's really just not feasible today, even if you stayed close to home.
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You have a very valid point that human voice isn't an automatic "explanation". It just seems that people particularly are bothered by it because, IMO, fans have had to do the interpreting through music. Thus, when you have shows such as BD's Yowza show, Seattle's air show, and Cadets last year and this... especially this year with the warmup starting with a complete explanation about how they're gonna do X, Y, and Z in the show, fans of all those prior years say, "I'm #### well smart enough to figure out what you're doing, provided the show itself provides direction." Think back to Cadets 92 -- the reason you remember it usually isn't the Holsinger, but that you attached your mind's pleasure of the music with the visual accompaniment of spinning ceiling fans and guard members in pseudo-flight suits.
This is absolutely the best post I've read on this topic. Bravo. I, for one, agree 100%.
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The fans and folks who pay money into this activity (or even the ones who don't spend much) shouldn't have an opinion or voice? C'mon now.
Ummmmmm ... I think Tekneek was being ironic.
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Oh, and (for clarification of course) that was the same brass staff (for the most part) that was there in *gasp* 2002.
Of course, brass was never really their main problem in '02 ... it was mainly about those dismal visual and guard scores, yeah?
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Sal's contract was not renewed by the board. None of the creative staff was fired. They all resigned.
Well ... that makes it all better, then.
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Do you (any of you) think it's really possible to keep both the new, young generation of fans/performers AND the legacy generation happy? To some extent, you're going to lose people either way.
True, you're going to lose "some" either way, but it's not like every fan over 40 has suddenly vanished. I still see plenty of older fans when I go to shows, and just from purely anecdotal evidence and my own observations, it seems like many of them are happier with the current product than they generally were 5 to 10 years ago.
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Madison hired Bill Howard to right the ship financially; it doesn't get much better than that.
So there was no way to "right the ship financially" without doing a competitive crash and burn, then?
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Yeah, the blue corps are a bad example, and i wish they did something different, but how can you possibly say everyone looks the same....we've been over this before, and if anything, uniforms look more different now than ever. My problem with uniforms is that most corps wont pick an identity and stick with it.
No, no, no. It was much better back when 90% of the corps wore either a "Cadet" uniform or a satin blouse.
P.S. I definitely agree with your comment about "identity." I was disappointed by the new looks that Spirit and Bluecoats chose to go with. Both are nice enough in their own right, but both are a radical departure from what we're used to seeing them in. I do think they both could have done a uniform update without quite such a drastic change.
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I don't hate the Cavaliers, I dislike their choice of programming over the past three years or so. And it is not a blind hatred or a token dismissal (as you have seemed to do to me) but I have actual reasons I have gone over many times before as to why I dislike the choices they make in the musical and visual program.
That's funny, because I've been flamed here on DCP for finding the Cavaliers shows from 2000 to 2003 to be absolutely non-musical and unlistenable. -
- I thought they made a big turnaround (for the better) in '04, and I've enjoyed them very much for the past couple years, and really loved 'em in Annapolis on the 16th. -
Shows I attend have a very nice mix of old and new.
Yes. That's what I've observed, as well. There will always be some people drifting away from the activity. I mean, how many old timers left back in the 70s, I wonder, when DCI really began moving away from its military roots with things like themed shows and whatever it was the Bridgemen were up to? How many hated the grounded percussion, low mark time, asymmetrical drill, and dancing color guards? How many thought Star '93 was a bridge too far? It ain't nothing new. There'll always be some fans who leave the activity behind. But as long as there are also new fans coming up, we should be okay, I think.
Booing and the Cadets
in DCI World Class Corps Discussions
Posted
"Rude," okay. But how is it "cowardly"?