johnnytech

No, you won't hear it unless you have the judges tape.

Actually, Phantom won friday night. SCV had a penalty, but PR director waived it off. Pure class. Saturday night, it came down to drum execution. Saturday night drum judge was a phantom hater. PR won drum execution either semis or quarters, but fell to 4th or 5th Saturday night. There was a drum tick right in front of him though, and it was mine and the judge put his tape to his mouth and acknowledged it. That Saturday night show was the most emotional show I have ever seen or been a part of. What PR did that night could only happen when a show was fabulous, and when it's coming from a 2nd place corps knowing they weren't going to win, so laid it all on the field. It was a rare combination, and sounds strikingly familiar to PR 2008 finals week. Except the outcome was different. The guys were kind enough not to mention it after the show. I replay that tick in my head ever August. Be glad you don't live with it.

I really want to believe that survival and expansion of the marching culture is at the heart of the George's goals. However, those formulas in the proposal greatly disturbed me though because they are anything but self-less. I await reconciliation on this. I have ideas on formulas. The whole revolt thing will not live up to my expectations (and I acknowledge those mean nothing...this is not my activity and I'm just a fringe consumer of the drum corps product) unless DCI is utterly dismantled and rebranded as extension or mirror of a marching band association with lean cost checks and balances. I'll stick around another day or so, but I'm turning off email notifications. I'll check back end of summer. G7 is likely going to stay quiet during summer. Comments on the Cavie's dig?

To George Hopkins, I'm the original poster and I agreed with your vision. What I understated before (bottom of my original post) I say now up front for clarity. As much as I support this upheaval, and think you should take it even further, if you don't change the formulas in your proposal, then you perpetrate a most offensive and aggrecious act. This will overshadow in my mind everything you've done for the activity and everything you do from now. And, if you retreat now after firing the first shot, you lose all street cred. You've gambled your legacy here. I appreciate the need for this revolution to bring about core change. You've sold me on your vision. You've won me over by showing me the end state vision you and 6 other well meaning power sources intend. But your formulas are purely amateurish and a core obstacle. When I read your proposal, I focussed on the vision.....the marching band integration and the model that will derive that allows more groups to flourish once again. I swelled up with emotion. But, there is still this issue of these formulas. However, I gave you the benefit of the doubt that simply you worked on the vision so hard, you forgot to work out the formulas better or hire a student of political science to do what you are not good at. Stick with the vision stuff and outsource where needed. Sure, have a power sliding scale for youself, but do not scale to zero. 10 votes or 100 votes for yourself is better starting point. And do not scale at some arbitrary G7 boundary. Again I encourage and reiterate, there is no room for negotiation. You and the G7 need to break clean and execute a full on revolt. Others will follow. But if it comes out that you hold fast to your current formulas, then you will have committed an immeasurable offense. Hiding an aggreciously self serving act under the guise of bettering our culture. Your legacy deserves to go down in flames if that is proven the case. My doubts are already setting in that your intentions are as totally self-less as I first had hoped. ------------------- Some responses to comments, First, I make no apologies for the over used analogies to government references and revolution. I'm a student of political science and I suggest a good awareness here will enlighten you on this topic as well. >> How are the G7 corps "bigger states"? Why do they deserve more representation? Please respond to that. The most important thing from political science that is missing in most observations I read is; Yes, it is ok that the bigger have more representation (votes). That's the republic ideaology our government is based on. California gets more votes than Iowa. Phantom Regiment Marching Band should have more votes than Madison Scouts MB, and more than fellow G7 group Santa Clara for that matter depending on the re-balance of votes ever 4 years. That is how a republic works. USA is not a democracy. This guy explains it better. Part 4 of a 10 part lecture series. Then watch part one. >> You should read DCI's business rebuttal. I don't care what they say, because my principles aren't found in a 5 year business plan. I prefer a culture for my children where there are more band summer group options and more local shows, all while being cheaper. Integraton with marching band culture is the way forward. >> What about A and AA and AAA. There is this better way...blah blah I don't care. I'm thinking a bit bigger than that. The voting formulas and the cash return formulas are where the focus should be. And acceptance that Cavalier Marching Band is the way forward. (And now that we're on Cavaliers, a better way forward would also be letting women join their ranks. How many local boy scouts from Rosemont city boundaries have marched in the Cavies in the last 20 years? Come on Cavies, your founding principle of serving local city young men has left the building. Thank god only one of you is left in the top 12. Not to mention that your non-profit status that protects your female discrimination could be put in jeopardy if found to participate in profit oriented business. Be careful where George may lead you. Or better, just stop the discrimination of local young high school female musicians and color guard). >> DCI's current members (and some of us "dinosaurs") would tend to disagree with you: See this link. >> 80 percent seem to want a separate identity from marching band. That entire article is utter garbage in relation to this revolutionary scale change. It basically asks a multiple choice question "do you like you?". It's statistically a non-valid contribution here. Why? The sample includes 100% of people who march now. What's not included are the thousands of kids who can't participate because the current drum corps model prices them out. What's not included are the hundreds of marching units that have closed their doors in the last 30 years (in reality, the students and organizer counterparts of today that are doing something else). And, most of all the responders vocal opinion doesn't matter anyway, because their future actions will be the real vote. What are those future actions? We are all consumers of the culture fed to us. And, we would all equally consume the same elite marching band culture G7 describes if it is the only game in town. Especially if summer marching bands flourish from this. >> but what does DCI do that you object to? DCI staff are not "lobbyists", unless you consider marketing and promoting drum corps "lobbying". It's not about what I object to, it's the objections from the members who are served by the governing body. I didn't have any objections until I read the .pdf. But in general, wasteful spending is always objectionable. DCI doesn't serve me except in the removed manner that I'm a consumer of summer marching music culture. The advertising they spend money on, the expensive stadiums they choose, the local staff at shows (that could easily be volunteers) serves the corps, not me. There is talk of a rebuttal from the dci.org people. Isn't that ironic. If dci.org was run leaner with less overhead, there wouldn't be staff members enough to prepare a rebuttal to save their jobs because there'd be no jobs to save. How many web admins and servers does dci.org operate? How about all the other corps? It seems to me The Blue Devils Marching Band has all the resources necessary currently to operate all web services for dci.org and all member marching bands as well. The savings from this could be returned in the form of lower member dues. Marcus

-I aged out in early 90s. -I marched in two of these G7 groups (Phantom and BD). -I have had nothing to do with drum corps since age out. -First show I even saw since then was 18 years later. -I recently discovered drum corps on internet and now volunteer at local high school marching band. -22 years ago I was biased against marching band while at the same time I participated in both. -Last week friend said read up on G7. I made my first visit to drumcorpsplanet.com yesterday since last August. Found the actual proposal .pdf right away. -I read the proposal without reading any comments. I read slowly every slide and gave it the attention it deserves. ------ -I gather from the .pdf that our government (DCI.org) has too many lobbyists (staff) and wasteful with our taxes (ticket sales). -I gather from the .pdf that ticket sales (taxes) go to support lobbyists and wasteful activities instead of grassroots activites (give back to corps). -I gather from the .pdf that the bigger states in our union (G7 corps) do not have enough federal representatives (drum corps votes) in the government. -I gather from the .pdf that drum corps of yesteryear is an unsustainable business model. -I gather from the .pdf that someone finally is brave enough to say, "enough of racial segragation in our schools!" (drum corps vs marching band). We are better off together than separate because of the times. -I know this was written by revolutionaries (visionaries). -I know you should not look to those in power to give up their power. -I know that no incumbent government (G7 nay sayers) will ever, NEVER vote themselves out of a job. Even when the power scale is proven flawed. -I know a revolution is expected and natural when the times eventually demand it. (The greatest flaw in our U.S. constitution is the lack of term limits on federal legislators. Congress will never, EVER vote for term limits and vote themselves out of a job as long as there is an incentive to keep the job). ------------------ -The slide that really caught my attention is slide no. 21. That's all I'll speak about now. Future Vision Positioning. "Drum Corps is America, as is marching band." "As we travel from town to town, we can recreate our position so that we are an American Celebration. We celebrate blah blah..." -Something in slide 21 made me pause and see the vision of what G7 is proposing. Of course in the spirit of all 66 slides I see analogies to the American revolution, and current big government, but in slide 21 I really see enlightened vision. Thank you G7. I read here that it's not about being in a "drum corps", but it's about being in a group activity celebrating marching music culture in the summer. That really touched me. After reading the rest of the slides, slide 21 is what I come back to now. I support this revolution in drum corps because you are, a) visionary with an enlightend plan, and b) have the balls to pull this off and not look back, because we'll be back here in 20 years if you back down. But, G7 as you suggest this revolution, you're asking for permission. Are you for real or not? Are you going to back down when the pragmatic fight back? Are you going to get weak in the knees when they send their red coats. George Hopkins, I haven't much cared for you. Always being just a tiny evolutionist. Always a complaining voice. Stupid narration. Stupid stupid narration. But godtamniit, now you've upgraded to a revolutionist and you've won me over with slide no. 21. But if you back down now, then frack you George. So do it. Dismantle drum corps and usher in a new vision. In fact, go further and drop the drum corps name and go with Cadets Marching Band. It's just a fracking word anyway, but it racially separates us from our brothers. Please just once and for all do it! Add whatever bloody wind instruments you want, but do it. Full on integration with marching band culture. Do it. Survivability of American celebration matters. Do it finally. I marched in Blue Devils Drum Corps, but if my kids march Blue Devils Marching Band in 10 years with saxophones, I'll be proud just the same. It's all American Celebration. But you are already messing it up by asking for permission. There is no negotiation. There is only total dismantle. Anything less is exactly that. Less. ---- -G7, I have two serious complaints with your proposal. Power distribution and financial distribution. 1. Representation in your new government (i.e. voting power) in your proposal doesn't scale. Sure go ahead and give the bigger and better states get more representation, even lopsided power, but it cannot scale to zero for even the smallest states. No matter the weakness of their voting share, at least they can sit at the table and debate. As soon as you take away their chair, thus begins the next revolution. Whatever algorithm you come up with, it also needs to be tied to an annual or bi/triannual re-assesment. Just like our real government does a census which drives how many representatives each state gets. 2. Federal subsidies. i.e. cash back for performances. Again, it can't scale to zero for the smallest states. Not acceptable. It can be a measely penny, but it can't be zero. And I strongly suggest you not include proceeds to dci.org in your proposed cash distribution formula. That's a sort of tortured flat tax thing. Messy and too easy to attack and claim unfair. If you had only G7 corps over and over at the shows, and times got tough, your current model will soon be deemed unfair as well within just those ranks. Instead make two steps. Take all cash proceeds from a show, use an weighted % based algorithm to distribute all proceeds to participating corps. Then use a tax model for corps to pay out their proportional tax rate back to government. Maybe it can be one formula, but logically it needs to be two so % based proportional tax is recognizable. Marcus

For me, I go with the average for the caption winner only because DCI forces that upon us. For the second place on downward in caption, I personally defer to finals night score only. Your point has merit though. Averaging is dubious anyway. Needs to go away. Its supposed to be a sport event after all.

Thank you Dave Gibbs! Marines are awesome. As I write this, the Marines stationed at Camp Fuji in Japan are sponsoring their base facilities for a local high school marching band camp. "Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem." -Ronald Reagan Marcus

Very funny!

I love that year's drum solo. I bought 85 albums so long ago and remember it well. I they can sell the albums with Suncoast on it, why can't they put on the website as well? Please report back with their answer.

You're example for me does not conclude averaging is bad. On the contrary it seems like an example of why averaging was put into place. What are you suggesting instead? Are both judges allowed to roam around on the field or is one delegated to the front line only? On a different topic, and sorry to highjack your thread, what I think IS bad is averaging across shows for awarding the drum trophy (quarters, semis, and finals). Apparently it has been done in the past and I'm curious if done still.

I like it. It is a feature, but didn't strike me as supposing to be the main drum feature. Anything that is a throw back to old school gets my vote. It's not my pick for ole skool lick of the week, but anything ole skool that brings attention to yesteryear drum corps is always a good thing. I've been wondering for years when is someone gonna just throw out some exposed tap rolls like 27th in NinerTwo. Finally we have a taker, go BD 2007 tap rolls from hell! Now please go check out 1981 27th.

Wow, a live suggestion for the corps through these forums. Hmm, nice idea. I'd like to suggest the the two horn soloists in the opener would dance or something together rather than stand at "at ease" for such a long period of time. Maybe without the helmets as well. There is a romantic quality to their duet and sans the helmets would add to this image.

I would have thought that during this point in the season very few people under 22 would have responded as they would be marching right now. Another suggestion for a poll would be "are you marching right now". I remember in my day I barely spoke to anyone outside of the corps the whole summer. I think I talked to my mother a couple times via payphone maybe, but for the most part was out of the loop. I suppose everyone marching has cell phones and wireless laptops with them now-a-days.

Phantom 1986 did two things that were cool. The far left snare drummer (as looking at the line from outside) threw his stick to the far right snare drummer. The throw itself was very exposed. He held the stick in his left hand with his fist clenched around the stick and then butted the bottom of the stick with his right hand. More like a canon shot than a throw. It was a blind shot too, he didn't really look but lean out and a bit to the right for clearance. We toured with them and I watched it many times and they never dropped. I imagine the first drop and it would've been pulled. It made it to finals, along with the next visual. The snare line also put these popular toy things back then called rubber wally walkers on the butt of the left sticks the whole season. The held up their sticks and spelled a word for a very short count. But it was so fast we couldn't read it. Finally near the end of the season I took pictures to capture it and then after the season we developed the roll of film and deciphered what they were spelling...which was "WALLY". It was a bit of a let down, I was hoping for something more lewd. It finally put the Wally Walkers on the sticks into perspective.

If they feel strongly that this averaging is an improvement, then they should be strong enough to average overall total scores as well for final placement.