cixelsyd

Expanding on this: Back in the day, the senior corps were held in higher esteem than the juniors. Because both junior and senior corps had similar levels of time commitment, they were similar in performance quality, with the seniors having a slight advantage due to experience and physical development. This began to change in the late 1960s, when the top juniors began following the example of the Troopers and taking tours. The additional rehearsals, performances and focused time together enabled touring junior corps to reach higher performance levels than their senior counterparts.

Responses to several diverse subtopics: There was an opening, slow tempo song before El Cumbanchero, probably the "dirge" ( ) you were referring to earlier. I do not know the name; evidently, the repertoire they originally announced was changed (La Suerte de los Tontos was dropped). Sensing some venom in your response, too... I could do without the venom myself. However, some frank discussion on how G7 changes affect the overall financial climate for corps at different levels is germane, and timely, if we can have it without the venom drowning it out. And I acknowledge that the Music City decision might be the result of completely unrelated issues specific to them that trump all else - but nevertheless, it goes down as another entry on a long list of cases where the open class financial model was not sustained long term. Our sustainability "batting average" is way, way lower in OC than in WC, which is odd considering that WC is higher cost. I think that deserves some examination. Since Music City made the DCI top 25 and competed in the world class semifinals, they do have relevance to this forum. I see no problem with creating a separate thread and moving the non-Music-City-specific discourse there. Motion seconded.

You seem to forget that "the proposal" was not just a piece of paper, but also presentations given in person to instructor/judge caucuses and the BOD. What is said in those rooms is as much a part of "the proposal" as the written portion.

But it is, to an extent. Obviously, G7 directors did not meet in a smoke filled room to discuss the threat Music City posed to them, and plot out their demise. However, the bottom line of the G7 debate is about how to allocate DCI revenue between G7 corps, other WC corps, and OC corps. G7 have proposed allocating more money to themselves, less to other WC, and less to OC. Some of their proposals have been enacted over the past three seasons. In that time, OC corps have been spontaneously combusting like fireworks shortly after sunset on July 4th. Even a couple of WC corps have gone down. No G7 corps have been sidelined by finances in or anywhere near that time frame. How is that working out so far?

100 matching band/corps uniforms, good condition, used only one season. Distinctive appearance when viewed up close. Free delivery to locations in the Dubuque, IA, area.

Academy was just at DATR last month. Technically, the Texas-based Crossmen did a Western swing in 2007, but not since then. That was also their most recent of 7 DATR appearances.

Lot of 128 medallions, silver with red/white/blue neck straps. Engraved "Drum Corps International - 1999".

What an excellent post. I keep saying we need more adults to run corps. When I read the sentence I underlined in your post, it dawned on me that we have a lot of recent college graduates with time on their hands (i.e. no job). Hope some get involved via internships, mentoring, or just by getting a copy of the DCI "how to start a drum corps" manual.

Bear in mind that some of those recordings sound very different because of microphone selection and position. In particular, mics close to the sideline had more of a tendency to pick out individuals, such that the recording is nowhere near the balance and blend you would have heard in the bleachers. The stickouts you hear on 1978 or 1984 recordings are not accurate renditions of the performances.

A long time, I think. Just going to 0.05 granularity ought to ease the situation. Full-fledged hundredths (0.01) would provide five times the precision we need. But your question does point out the possibility that if we had many more corps in the future - or if the box system changed such that all corps are crammed into the 90s - it is still possible to create a number management challenge even with more numbers to choose from.

Yes - DCI. (No, really. One reason DCI was formed was to administer the selection and training of judges. There were several judging organizations pre-DCI, but the corps were not completely happy with any one of them, and even less happy having to deal with several of them instead of one "standard".)

If everybody else is there, yes. But again, I invite you to look at other shows, like those at the end of June: Crown BD Pacific Crest Mandarins Here, for one caption in the Crown-BD battle to receive any greater weight than the others, it has to rise to the severity of a title contender losing the caption to a non-finalist.

?

Why would you want to "replicate audience perspective"? I look forward to recordings so that I can hear the details I missed due to screaming fans, crying babies, talking neighbors and mid-show ovations.

Not true. The departure of the 2008 guard designer is also often cited as a factor.

As I understand it, those were arguments mentioned in the caucuses and boardrooms where the proposal was debated and ultimately ratified. (And yes, they were also mentioned on DCP and RAMD in discussions of similar context.)

First, can I see a recap with the height numbers the last judge came up with?

Correct. If your recordings are old enough (1950s), you can hear the single-valve bugles that limited the selection of notes to the point where some chords in certain music had to be altered. But buglers began pulling slides to fill in the missing chromatics, and shortly thereafter, a rotary valve was added to perform that function. Intonation was greatly improved by the G-F bugle design, first used in 1968. You will hear a whole thread full of dissenting opinions on this. Good luck sifting through the myths. The "any-key brass" rule change of 1999 was a Trojan horse for transitioning DCI away from G to Bb/F brass. At that time, only two entities still made G "bugles", while several others had ceased the practice and still others had refused to ever make G horns. The transition to Bb/F enabled DCI corps to do business with these other manufacturers, which stimulated competition in the market and eventually lead to an improvement in equipment quality. Aside from that, several factors prevent us from "proving" who improved what when, and how. - For one thing, the "bugles" of 1999 were, according to some sources, really just band instruments with different length piping to change the key. Earlier bugles had different bore size and shape compared to their band instrument counterparts. - Changes in the approach to brass technique swept through DCI at about the same time as the key change. It is difficult to demonstrate whether changing sounds were due to changing equipment, or changing approach to playing. - Historically, something about the bugle gave it a relative advantage in projection outdoors compared to band brass instruments. As more and more of the biggest DCI events moved to indoor venues, that became less relevant. From the above, you can make a strong case for either G or Bb/F being "better".

This is, essentially, the "ordinal" concept Jeff Fiedler proposed several years back. The problem with ordinals is that they give no concept of how close competitors are to each other. Your mileage will vary tremendously from one contest to another as the lineups change. For example, say 2014 picks up where 2013 left off. We could have shows in SoCal in late June that look like this: Carolina Crown Blue Devils Pacific Crest Mandarins Crown wins most captions, but is way behind BD in drums. In reality, the top two are very closely matched, but the ordinals say otherwise. Two weeks later, everybody meets in Minneapolis. Carolina Crown Blue Devils Cadets Vanguard Bluecoats Phantom Regiment Cavaliers Boston Crusaders Madison Scouts etc. Again, Crown wins most captions, but is way behind BD in drums. In reality, the top two are very closely matched. This time, because all the other corps are present, Crown places 7th or 8th in the percussion caption, and the ordinal total puts them behind BD. In the ordinal system, the final outcome is no longer a function of how two corps compare, but rather, how many other corps can sandwich themselves in between.

Why "should" they get a 9.9? (Of course, if we are talking DCI, you probably mean 19.8, right?) I think this is one of those "contradictory premises" corpsband was referring to. The idea that the season-ending caption winner must score within an increment or two of full scale can cause conflict with the prime directives of judging (i.e. rank, then rate). To a lesser extent, the desire to have scores continually increasing (as if they are truly an objective measure of day-to-day improvement), or the box system itself, can also box a judge in.

Cadets tuba line? Their props were easier to hear. And no discussion of thunderous goo is complete if Pacific Crest is not mentioned.

So sorry for misunderstanding. I completely missed your hatred for the practice when you said the judge "did nothing even remotely wrong". My irony meter must be on the fritz.

Several thoughts: a. When Academy started, one of the unique things they did was to bring a number of different, really big names in to work with them in a clinic or other short-term setting. As a result, their kids (and in-house staff, I suppose) had already learned from the best before they even entered a contest. This is a trick they should have stuck with... but I fear that once they became a world class threat, the primary employers (corps-wise) of such top clinicians no longer allowed them to spend any time with Academy. b. The 2013 show had significant design flaws that set them back. Either you make the changes mid-season and play catchup, or you stick with a flawed show, try to perform it that much better, and play catchup. c. They did not do their annual stage show in early June, so you would expect they would be better prepared for the start of the season than ever before - but they were not. When you compete in WC, you go up against 16 corps who have been going full time since Memorial Day. If you are not as well prepared as they are, a battle for 17th may be your best remaining outcome. To answer the OP question, here are two things I think would move them forward competitively: a. The design staff need to improve. Either their existing designers get smarter, or they hire smarter designers. b. Pre-season preparation should ramp up. If they had presented their full show at their home contest on June 19, maybe they could have gotten feedback (admittedly, only from a smaller judging panel) and corrected some design flaws before the Denver show.

We can have shows that appeal to the one-time viewer, and also include layers and details that encourage repeat viewing. This is not an either-or proposition.

It is not necessary to "pound the crap out of the instruments" to project to the press box. Zero. Modern drum corps uses the electronically amplified derivative of rosewood as sensed by a nearby microphone. First of all, that is an enormous exaggeration. Mallet parts never required doubling when the battery and hornline were not both playing fortissimo. Anyway, most sections of a drum corps double parts. Horns are 8, 12 or 24 to a part. Snares, 9 to a part. Yet, they are still interesting. I keep hearing that tympani are going away. Already, several corps have simply gone without tympani. How much better did they sound?