PCSoprano9702

It's difficult to say where PC will place having only seen this show. It's certainly a contender, but whether there are 11 better shows this year only time will tell. Like all toddlers, he thinks he's a drummer. I hope he outgrows that phase, for our neighbors' sake.

Yesterday I took my 2.5 year old boy to Corps at the Crest in Walnut, CA. Below are his comments on each performance. All Age Class 1 SoCal Dream 60.400 "This is a quiet one." Open Class 2 Impulse 61.850 "This is a loud one!" 3 City Sound 53.350 "The white one is dancy!" 1 Gold 68.500 "Big drums go like this!" World Class 4 Mandarins 67.850 "The bridge ones have cool 'brellas!" 3 Pacific Crest 70.300 "They're your favorite, not my favorite, Daddy." 1 Carolina Crown 81.200 "Wow! They're pretty loud!" 2 Blue Devils 80.900 "I like the rocket ship one. The blue ones are my favorite!" However the review of the night goes to our neighbor, who leans over to me during the Carolina Crown show and says, "Please, tell me more about this not needing words to express things."

The Pacific Crest Drum and Bugle Corps was named in 1993 for the Pacific Crest National Scenic Trail (a hiking/biking/horseback riding trail from Baja California to British Columbia). After 55 years the trail was finally completed in 1993, passing through the mountains above Diamond Bar, California. The name also ties the Corps to the Pacific Ocean and carries the connotation of being the highest and best, like the crest of a wave. I seem to recall that the name was chosen by vote of the 13 members of the inaugural corps (who began to regret it after being continually introduced as "Pacific Coast"), but I don't know of any alternative names.

What is it about electronic keyboards, not saluting, microphones, speakers, and Bb horns that make drum corps abhor an 8 bar phrase? We were told these measures were improvements to reduce costs to corps and improve musicality. Yet tour fees increase, ticket costs increase, and I can't get more than 8 notes from La Suerte de los Tantos. Stand out shows aside, I'm having a hard time liking this activity.

So very much to all of this (except skipping the little guys, as I know how it feels to play to empty stands). I often struggle with how much I love drum corps and how much I hate drum corps shows - you've captured my thoughts exquisitely. Great comments on the performances as well.

Welcome to Santa Barbara. Los Angelenos flood the freeway coming in on Friday and going home on Sunday. It's always been that way. UCSB didn't charge for parking. A first, I'm sure of it. I'd prefer that the trucks be down by the Thunderdome and let the fans park by the stadium, personally. I agree, however that Drums along the Beach should be at La Playa Stadium downtown. Steep stands, great view (no back stands, just beach!). But I'm not complaining as I live 2 miles from Harder Stadium.

YES! Biking to a drum corps show for the first time ever! CENTRAL COAST DRUM CORPS!

Two brass-holes?!? There's got to be a better way to say that.

Speaking of the gate... Why do so many corps walk to the gate, shuffle to the end zone, march to the middle of the field, then walk to their opening set? It's visually dull and takes way more time than marching in. I just don't see the benefit. I hope someone can set me straight.

It's worse when a group you love pushes you away like this. Though all this electronics makes Bb much more palletable.

I didn't mean for my show comments to be aimed at the corps membership. The quality of the show at this early stage has more to do with staff than members. The staff need to budget their rehearsal time to have a complete, decent program by the first show. This allows them and their membership an entire summer of cleaning/tweaking resulting overall in better shows at the end of the season. I don't think anyone in the stands expected a championship performance.

This may have been the least satisfying drum corps show I've ever been to. You can excuse some of it as "opening night jitters" but there were a lot of fundamental mistakes on the field and a lot of uninspired programs. These corps have a lot of work to do yet. It's disappointing to pay full price and get a partial production. I can't imagine June 20 snuck up on them! SCV, the traditional worst offender in this regard, saved the show with a great production. Kingsmen - small exhibition group, saw them from the side waiting to get in. Guard uniforms look like nuns. Playing West Side Story SoCal Dream - playing Santana, some drill issues and feet in their horns but sound great standing still. Soloists rock! VK - A decent show, but not terribly funny. I hope more gags get added in as they clean their show. The "story" of the girl who falls of the highwire is hard to follow, and doesn't present the emotion their striving for quite yet. I liked the running man bit. Mystical - best part of the show was helmet-watch. Though you'd think with 3 drum majors for a ~40 person horn line, one of them could walk out there and pick it up (psst. this is why you have field judges!). Much improved over last year. Impulse - needs a lot of work. I was so annoyed by the design and performance that I was forced to watch the drumline exclusively. Coincidentally, they have a great drum line - possibly the best in Div II. I hope the rest of the corps can catch up. Incognito - old school BD uniforms and brass horns look very cool from high up. The code names for staff and the DM are pointless and cheesy. By far their best sound and look was before the salute (do they get credit for that?) big GE moment with their inexplicably timed/sized corps flag seemed wasted so early in the show. Gold - can't remember the show, but I enjoyed it. Clear winners of Div II with a solid sound and an apparent effort to acheive in their demanding drill. Intermission - met up with a number of old friends. Drum corps shows are great for that. General disappointment with the whole keyboard business among them. Parking the drum line for the ballad seems to be a requirement in Div II this year. A waste of bodies in the drill and clean marching demonstration by the silent drumline. Not sure why they all seemed to do that. Mandarins - Finally some drum corps! Keyboards add a low end to the brass impacts which still feels like cheating ("where'd all those contras come from" *look at left hand of girl at keyboard* ... "Oh...") Great show. Most demanding book I've heard from them in ages (ever?). Pretty clean and well poised visually - they look like their trying. Loved the show, don't see a theme but don't need one to enjoy it. Academy - This music sounds familiar. Last year's show made better. Musically and visually dirty, but I can see what they're going for. I look forward to seeing how this develops by 7/3. The guard is vastly improved and really contributes to the show's emotion and design. PC - Love the new uniforms, very fitting to the corps personality and visually very striking. The reflective shakos can be distracting. I don't see much potential in this show. Hopefully I'm wrong and a cleaner show will pop for me. A corpsmember operates the mixer board throughout the show. While I don't care for mixerboards, I believe this is more appropriate than some staffer in flip-flops operating it. Seems like it should be a requirement, actually. Love the 6 person cymbal line! BD - CHAIRS! It's a drum, bugle, and chair corps. Reminded me of the dice from 92 in the opener, then like caterers in a banquet hall rearranging chairs thereafter. The drum line is exceptional! Some neat horn parts, a taste of Happy Days are Here Again from a late 80s BD show. It'd be neat to get more melody out of them. There's an emotional disconnect. Very busy show, but could contend for the title... I think it has what judges like. SCV - I saw this corps at the gate and turned 16 all over again. Love the uniforms! The DMs look good from high up, but weird up close. This show is great. I have watched SCV shows develop a lot over the years and I see this growing into a great show. Very clean, and a little safe visually - but clean drill is so much more striking than running around chaotically. App. Spring is great! If I had a baby, it would have been on the track by the end of the company front. PC "victory" concert - sounds much better standing still. Loved Ave Maria. I think it would have been better after retreat as a) that's when I/we expect a victory gig and b) there were a bunch of people who clearly had no interest and were distracting. So yea corps, boo show schedule! Retreat - DMs only. no medals (economy?). Scores were uninteresting and as I expected. VK's retreat routine continues to fall flat. They made me more angry than amused. Would have rather seen them in folding chairs. BD might have some they could borrow! Audience - 3-4 friends of VK kids snuck into the seats behind me and babbled non-stop. I realize they're high school kids, but I really wish they'd show some tact and not talk through the show they stole seats to see. If you want to trash talk, whisper, that's what the adults do! VK's DM came and sat with them for a while. He was quiet and respectful. I wish he could have taught his friends a lesson (he looked tired, actually). A guy a few rows back took a phone call in the middle of Mystical's production. There was a grand pause after a loud part and this loser completely yells, "What?" into his phone. The stadium's built into a hill, in 20 steps he could have been behind the press box! I decided to stare at him for the rest of his phone call (I enjoyed Mystical's show more when I was just listening and not distracted by the helmet drama). Phone guy didn't get the message, but his wife sure did! She turned red and mouthed an apology. Even with her pleading, he stayed on the call that clearly wasn't urgent. Fortunately I get another show next week on the beach in Santa Barbara. While my favorite (SCV) won't be there, I'm looking forward to Bluuuuuuu! I hope there's a good turnout for this show, it's been 12 years since we've had drum corps on the Central Coast.

Wow... SCV... I think I may be done with so-called "drum corps." Goodbye.

Yes!

Yes, but they'd be drum corps slaves - which still sounds pretty bad until you consider they march for free.

Well yeah, but so what. It's GE. I don't believe there's a penalty for fake playing. As long as it acheives...

Wes, I think some background as to the motivation for testing and where we can go from here may help you. I encourage you to look up "Reinventing Government" by David Osborne to get a grasp on where these mandates are coming from. Osborne argued for performance-based government: find a metric, and use it to evaluate employee performance. This book became very popular as it was implemented by the Clinton Administration in 1993. Where it falls short is the definition of a metric. In education, it's become test scores. They're measuring how well a student did on a test, not how much the teacher was able to educate the student. It's a focus on easily measurable outputs instead of the actual intended outcomes. To that end you may want to check out the first chapter of Denhardt and Denhardt's "The New Public Service" which blasts Osborne's ideas (which they call "new public management") and offers a less concrete, but more meaningful way to measure performance - public opinion. It's a neat idea, but in education it assumes a very wise, engaged, and large PTA - which is pretty rare. I wouldn't spend too much time in either book, but both, particularly Osborne, have some neat "success" stories in education. It would be very cool to check in on those stories 17 years later and see what came of their programs.

I agree, somehow those seem like "real" bugles to me. I know that's arbitrary, but you can't change me. I'd show any of last year's shows to John Phillip Sousa, see what he thinks of marching music of the new millenium.

I actually kinda like it when the dog bites, when the bee stings. Is that weird?

If you haven't heard brass arranged well on a drum corps field, then maybe you just don't like drum corps. That's ok. I don't like dog shows. But I don't try to add rifles and saber work into it just to please myself (there's got to be a better way to say that!). Though a rifle squad at a dog show would be pretty sweet...

Who defines success as fewer members? I get that drum corps is an elite activity, but I don't think it should only be for the elite to participate. I agree that the unique medium of drum corps is dying/dead. Every once in a while I see what I miss, but it's rare. The Beatles distortion was a guitar played poorly. The reason drum corps sounds like bad trumpet playing to some is because they don't understand the bugle. Phantom of the Opera was a well told story that required no shirtless people, overstaged guard, or electronics.

I am reminded of an early episode of the Simpsons where the Superintendent tours Springfield elementary to determine if the campus passes inspection. In one quick cut he's standing on a ladder looking at the flag and says, "48.. 49.. 50, very good Skinner, everything appears to be in order here." When I was in Troopers in 2000 we had stylized Betsy Ross flags that did end up on the ground. I asked how Troop could do such a thing, and was told that these flags didn't have enough stars to count as Old Glory, the Union Jack was missing a few stripes, and that corps used to use this loophole all the time "back in the day."

I may eventually come to believe this. This is the most believable story yet.

Most dictionaries are describtive. That is, if people use it that way, it's a definition for that word. So, using a dictionary to settle nomenclature is pretty pointless. Personally, alumnus and student never sat well with me. I now use alumnus for lack of a shorter term, but I still say "member." To me it more accurately reflects the sense of ownership and belonging. But I won't argue the point as it's mostly a matter of perspective.