Ron Burgendy

Can't wait to see what the Northeast brings out this year...

Opener - Kingfishers Catch Fire II Ballardish Piece - Turning You got to listen through the beginning Closer - Turbine Sounds pretty cool to me. Sounds Spartanesque... and new. Can't wait to see what they do with it.

I wonder who the instructional staff is then? They don't have them listed. Maybe they are still finalizing who it is?

Who are you to make a wild accusation like that? What research... did you talk to the new staff members personally. Show some proof. Why do you insist on driving people away from them. Are you that bitter that the staff up and left that you would rather see them fold than put out a successful season. PURE SELFISHNESS. And about rumor spreading... It is fair to say that there is an entirely new staff. But almost all corps have acquired new staff and I wouldn't be shocked if a hand full of them have mostly new staff members. But trying to distract people away is odd to me. I don't understand why someone would say "You are better off not marching at all than to march there." and try to destroy the activity for those that do try and participate.

What Truth?! Have any of the former staff members spoke or posted personally? Has The director come and posted anything? No! They have not. That makes it rumor and here say. I do not wish to be a part of that. We may never know what happened. But these rumors may be the doom of Spartans and it is not my wish. I hope that old vets and new members can look past what may or may not have happened and realize that the Spartans will go out with a quality program as they always do. Because no one may ever truly know what happened.

The reason for my post was not to engage a discussion on the staff leaving. I don't think that it is appropriate for people to comment on things that they know nothing about. No one know the REAL reason why the staff left. The only people who know what happened are Peter and the former staff members. I rely on my information from their website and my friend that marches there. Being in Penn, it is difficult to know exactly what is going on. But I want to point out that my friend said there were 39 horn players at the open house. I think they fielded right around that many in 2003. I am not worried about membership. This is also obviously a very touchy subject considering all the former members posts. I simply wanted to invoke discussion of the new visual designer and if anyone has seen his drill live or to comment on the stuff on his site. I am sorry the discussion went the way it did and its getting way too emotional and way out of control. I would appreciate it if someone would close this forum to prevent further rumors and for the well being of the organization.

http://www.georgehester.com/ The new designer's website and man he does some cool stuff. Should be an interesting year!

It strikes me as odd that a man of such age and wisdom as yourself would, for lack of a better phrase, "pick on" a sixteen year old. "Hay Mr. WIIIIIIIIIIIILSON!"

How much is the payback to the smaller corps who need the money? ZERO.

Whole point of my post.

When you put it that way it sounds reasonable its the payback to the corps is pathetic.

Your sarcasm is lovely however in regards to your comments... "It doesn't cost anything to put fuel in nor new tires on safe buses." Yes it does. But the corps is responsible for that not DCI. "It doesn't cost anything to buy new musical instruments. (You can just go down to your local instrument pile and take whatever you want.)" Refer to above. "It doesn't cost anything to hire incredible music educators to teach corps members." Refer to above. "No one has to pay for musical arrangements or for licensing to the publishers. It's free for the asking!" Refer to above. "All the food you could ever want is free! Take it! There's plenty more where that came from!" I like to think of myself as a glutton... but again... refer to above. "Bus and truck drivers are willing to work for free!" Some do. I am 90% sure that the assistant director for East Coast Jazz used to drive the bus. So you are half right, but if they are paid for... refer to above. "Uniforms are endless and don't cost anything either." Refer to above. "Stadiums don't charge anything for rentals to marching music groups." Again. Refer to above. side note: How come the smaller corps who make less money don't get paid for placement but have the same bill with no help from DCI and still charged for enter shows. "No one needs any sort of insurance in this day and age." Again its the corps responsibility to budget that. "Judges work for free, and they pay their own way to shows and sleep in their own cars." This is not the corps responsibility to pay for this, so thats is one and a half right for you? "You're right! This is highway robbery!" Yes I still believe it is. "Can you say "get over yourself," and "grow up?"" Yes I can. If youare insuating that I need to grow up you are the silly one my friend. "Discuss." Yea not all of the money goes to the corps. The payback to the actual corps is WEEEEEEEEEEEAK. Not to mention the fact that smaller corps dont get compensated for placement. Discussion over... I win.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?!?! $299 to see drum corps with cheapest seats being $179!?any other seats put you in the endzone! God I pay less to go see an opera. Is this becoming an "upper class" form of entertainment? Before you know it members will have to pay to get in to see the shows after they perform. Can you say Rape and Pillage? Discuss.

Who said they were in the first place? Did they ever announce that? If they did have plans to i would assume that they would not apply for world class status with a whole new staff and no idea of a member turn out yet.

Well if you go to the website www.spartansdbc.org you can see that the staff is not announced nor is there a link anywhere, except for previous years staffs. Usually that means that the organization is looking for some new or additional staff.

June 23 Walnut, CA June 24 Glendale, AZ July 15 Calabasas, CA July 21 San Antonio, TX July 22 Denton, TX July 23 Enid, OK July 25 Lincoln, NE July 28 Denver, CO August 2 Tuscon, AZ August 3 Lake Havasu City, AZ August 4 Tempe, AZ August 9, 10 Pasedena, CA So they performed only 11 times not including finals week, obviously 13 with finals week. Not a whole lot of shows for two full months of touring corps. The cadets... I counted, performed 30 TIMES!!! Not including the three final days... so.. granted I do think Academy... with HARD evidence was a regional corps... and dsb... i was only three performances off my guess... but now its educated.

Score lower according to who tom? They are not judged on the same sheets...so its not proven that the 13-17th place corps are better than the top two.

I think his condescension was caused from your lack of research. If you looked at the Academy's show schedule they barely did any shows. I think the most, not counting finals was 6. So they performed at a show about 10 times last year, as oppose to The Cadets who performed basically every other day. Sounds like a Regional Division 1 to me. Again not meant to be condescending, just stating where he was coming from. It bothers me too when people blindly post.

There is no way a REAL person could abandon a group of kids because one payment to the salary was missed. If they did skip out... they should not have been teaching there in the first place because they were there for the wrong reason.

Same as div III corps fielding 30 to 35 horns against 20 horns... makes a big difference

In response to your comment on Spartans. I would believe that it would be a financial move more than a competitive move. It is so much more cost effective to be a Div I corps. You get paid for shows, you don't pay for housing, horn and percussion equipment endorsements, instant growth of membership = more money, and you do not have to go on a full tour to be a Div I corps. You must make two championship events, and finals. So they rehearse every day but Monday anyways, took a three week "mini" tour and their final three week tour at the end and it did not seem to effect their membership this year. Money talks and can quickly change and organizations thoughts. So why would it be such a problem to go Div I if they didn't have to change anything.

Apparently only dutch gets credit...

WOW. Holy jerkish sarcasm batman. :sshh:

I am sory but if that guy was such a great person, even if this was the case, the fact he would abandon the kids does not make me think that he is such a great teacher afterall. If you look at the recaps... there visual performance scores have been improving greatly and consistantly where as other areas are not as strong. It appears that your brothers sister friend or whatever is making excuses. IMO. Also, I could understand their varying scores iun General Effect, since almost every review I read said nothing really grabbd their attention and it was a forgettable show. Not that I have seen them yet. They apparantly have great vertical alignment, but maybe the show just isn't there. You never know.

Did it ever occur to anyone that maybe they just are not as great as everyone hyped them up to be. It seems the only corps living up to hype is Dutch boy right now. But you never know til everyone gets on the west coast this weekend. It seems the corps that don't talk about themselves are doing the best.