Gaddabout

I just can't imagine DCI without George Hopkins. He is owed a good deal of credit of sustaining a portion of the activity, at least on the East Coast. I don't know if it's true, but I'm told Hop marched Crossmen without even being able to read music. I know he was the Cadets' percussion caption head for at least two years before taking over the corps in 1982. He created YEA in the early 90s which now includes Hop's home corps the Crossmen and is (as far as I know) the biggest single benefactor to drum corps. Forget any disagreements you have with the man. He's vital to DCI and it probably would not be the international phenomenon it is without him. I will be deeply saddened if he retires.

I think it's very difficult to build a new corps from the ground up in the midwest. Wisconsin already has Madison and there are plenty of D-1 corps in neighboring states. That said, what Pioneer does with its young players is pretty dang impressive. DCI is better for having them around.

Factory Metal makes some very cool stuff. One of my friends is an endorser. It wouldn't be a problem with Zildjian since they are considered FX and NOT cymbals. Don't let the product name confuse you. Zildjian makes nothing like these. They'd be a great addition to any corps pit.

Agreed. Uniform stick heights usually = clean playing.

This is interesting. All my friends would come back from corps looking like they were protein deficient. Even the best food crews probably don't realize the demands for protein on 18 to 22-year-old bodies. Especially the men. Supplements like this would not only aid in energy and performance, you'd return at the end of summer looking like you'd spent three months lifting weights! (Thought I wouldn't advise massive protein intake for the pit crew ... probably a good way to gain weight) Careful with the creatine. I don't think there have been enough studies at the way the body absorbs the synthetic stuff. I'd be concerned about the kidneys and liver.

Moeller technique, like Gladstone technique, dates back to early American drum corps history. The names aren't helpful because everyone has their own take on these techniques. In the world of drum set instruction they're often confused with everything from French Grip to basic finger control. Sanford Moeller developed it while watching Civil War drummers and the action they got. It's most likely something very similar to the oldest military-style stick motions to survive. It's a great tradition to pass on. It's funny, because true Moeller Method -- the violent whipping action to create rebound (and the mastering control of that rebound) -- runs counter to what was taught in most drum corps for years (i.e. anchored wrists, all wrist action, limited pivot at the fulcrum). Done properly Moeller looks a LOT like monkey sticking. You had to do it that way to get that kind of rebound off the calfskin's head. In fact, the first time I saw monkey sticking I thought it was a nice homage to Moeller! What Moeller Method -- or really just the modified Moeller principles -- has become is a way to combat the unnatural motions a lot of drummers picked up on their own, and some bad motions unfortunately improperly taught. It's a way to get back to the American tradition of letting the stick do the work for you. It's all about freeing up the stick to pivot at the fulcrum and letting stick inertia work for you. It's definitely a great way to prevent carpal tunnel and other repetitive motion disorders. Jazz drummers have been using this since the very beginning of the genre (military/parade-style drums beginning!) and jazz drum instructors have been quietly passing it on to those that bothered to study the genre. Until very recently it was something strictly passed down through oral tradition, primarily because it's considered a very advanced thing. It was almost lost to the American tradition because it wasn't being taught formally. Fred Sanford learned it from Anthony J. Cirone, who learned it from Saul Goodman, who learned it from (probably) Moeller himself or possibly one of the other small group of experts (like Jim Chapin). If not for Chapin I doubt we'd know much about it today. To this day I marvel at those old lines who used Moeller to the exclusion of all else. Because of the whipping motion, it must've taken military-like drilling to get those stick heights uniform. Oof! So getting back to your response (finally), the tilt has nothing to do with Moeller Method. The tilt is an excuse to justify the continued use of traditional grip (plus it's just a nice effect and a hat tip to snare drumming tradition). Moeller Method can be used for either traditional or matched, although its origins are based on methods used by old snare drummers who carried their drums on slings (making it necessary to play traditional grip) and played on unresponsive calf-skin heads (not unlike playing on a thin pillow, compared to today's heads, which are akin to playing on concrete).

With all the successful VK alumni there in SoCal, it's hard for me to believe they don't have vets lining up to donate some cash to make sure they're flush. As far as that goes, I think DCI has a vested interest in VK's return, but no one's voted me DCI czar just yet. ;)

One suggestion: - I was once a teenager and a competitive baseball player, but as a pitcher I had a problem finishing games. I'd wear out. My pitching coach once trained as a Chinese Olympian and he made me do duck walks all off-season. I did it -- with objections -- but it did exactly what he said it would do. After a couple of months, walking normally felt like walking on the moon and I had energy to spare. http://www.ucd.ie/shaolin/newsletters/PDF%.../LuoHanKung.pdf

They could start a couple weeks earlier. ;) I thought Vanguard had one of those years where they would have been more competitive with the Top 3 if they had another two weeks to get that show down. They were missing some marks and not gelling like Vanguard gels on a finals night. Good show though, challenging, and I was really impressed with what they did. Probably need to add a couple more technical ticks here and there. Was happy to see Vanguard still puts on shows that pop with color. That's what defines that corps to me.

There's an 86 Blue Devils tattoo on my heart.

I guess it also depends on what you think of as a lot of notes. Diddles, drags, and rolls sound like a lot of notes, but it's like bread before a meal. The flam hybrids ... those raise the bar for a line for me. I've heard bass lines whip those out lately.

My wife saw her first show on Aug. 4, and had the same comments about Crown while watching the ESPN2 broadcast. She wanted to know why they didn't at least do better than SCV. I explained I felt SCV executed more difficult material, and I really did feel their horn section blew well on finals. She didn't quite grasp my explanation until she watched BD. She said, "Wow, they really brought something extra to that performance. They were intense!" For someone who had never seen a drum corps show before, I thought she was starting to "get it" quickly.

Anyone remember the BD tenors "cocaine" flash? I couldn't believe they got that one on the field. Great stuff! I've always wanted to see the 80s Spirit stick toss. Hear about it, never seen it.

I'm also confused about the "dense" comment. I think some people are a little fooled by the BD mystique, because the density of the battery book comes and goes depending on the music. If anyone remembers Buddy Rich Suite from the 80s, that was not a very dense book, but the level of difficulty was very high ... lots and lots of singles with the accelerando from the snare line. BD has had some years that I've come away disappointed from the lack of BD-ness in the battery book. But that's just a snare drummer talking. The composition is usually great to my ears. I think BD has become much more of an ensemble battery over the years, and all the added movement makes what they do extremely difficult. I think they've almost cut back on the snare arrangements because they move so much more than they used to. The dips and steps and choreography ... it really raises the bar on difficulty. Conversely, I've NEVER heard more notes than I heard from Phantom the last two years. Their book is just insane. It must be a pack of black pages. They had flam combos I found entirely unnecessary, and if I hadn't seen them with my own eyes, I wouldn't have even noticed them. I could only ask ... why? It's fun for a snare drummer like myself to hear it, I guess, but if I'm putting a competitive corps on the field, I have to know ahead of time there's only so much reward you can get from level of difficulty until it starts to eat away at general effect. The Cavs book, by comparison, seems to have been pulled back over the years. They are doing far less blowing from start to finish, and composition/effect is way up. I think the years they won high drum their book was probably not in the top 5 in level of difficulty to my ears. At least the battery. They've been pretty good at picking their spots to blow. When they do, it's good stuff. But we're talking about high drum, and if I'm not mistaken, pit = exactly 1/2 of the score. The battery ... everyone's good. Seriously, you could pull any Top 15 corps and you'd have to be a super geek to tell the difference between the books and the quality of performances. Everyone thinks they hear slush in the snare line or gaffes in the tenors and basses, but it's usually people hearing want they want to hear (i.e. mistakes from the competitors). By finals, most of the battery is pretty solid. The pit books are much more varied, and you can definitely tell a difference between, say, the No. 3 corps and the No. 10 corps. No. 10 may play beautiful, but No. 3 is probably making someone's eyes bug out. I can't remember a year where I didn't think this ... pits seem to be make the difference between a very good performance and high drum.

The only three-word sentence more irritating than "it's not fair!" is "you owe me!" Pretty much the same attitude either way. I was pretty happy to see that stuff for free. And now I'll be buying the DVD for all the shows.

Never thought I'd quote Jim Rome, but he usually starts his show off with the right idea: "Have a point and don't suck." That's the creative process for me. I don't think anyone does anything creative without first doing it to entertain or amuse themselves. If you don't like it, what are the chances anyone else will? One of my favorite music stories is Sting talking about playing in this moderately popular band called The Police. He was sitting at the window looking at someone on the street and felt compelled to write a song at the keyboard for no other reason than to amuse himself. The song was "Roxanne," and it launched the Police and Sting's career. Upon accepting some kind of lifetime achievement award, Sting later gave the greatest five-word speech I've ever heard: "Music is its own reward." He's exactly right. None of us would do this if it didn't first engage us, inspire us, amuse us, entertain us. We are first compelled to do so because we enjoy it, not because we think someone else will. It's just that the best artistic work is usually first derived from personal insight or personal vision, and it just so happens to capture the imagination of others. Most "work of genius" is usually a lucky strike at the right moment that captures the attention of the masses. I have little doubt the most beautiful ballad ever composed or the most profound poem ever written is probably collecting dust somewhere in some forgotten town buried by years and years of geology and human indifference.

You're doing well, but let me explain what I really meant (and you'll understand just how petty I was being -- for the sake of sarcasm, which is a noble cause): - Every roll has a "skeleton" underneath. This is especially important for open-stroke rolls, which have a very literal metric value. For example, double strokes over a sixteenth-note skeleton = 32nd notes. Your wrists are playing 16th notes, but you are adding a second stroke twice the value of the note for the stroke. Does that make sense? Sixteenths are pretty standard skeleton. Some of the more advanced snare books will have open-stroke rolls over sextuplets (16th-note triplets) and even open-stroke rolls over 32nd notes, which is down right mean at brisk tempos. If you've ever heard a snare line that sounded like they were "shifting gears," they probably started an open roll over one skeleton and shifted to another (most often I hear from 16th note skeletons to 32nd note skeletons ... a nice element, but a little overdone these days, and often a good way to turn a clean snare line into the world's biggest slushee). Eighth-note triplet skeletons are a pretty standard way to draw criticism from other lines because everyone knows it's way easier to clean up rolls with with a triplet skeleton than sixteenths. Put it at march time and you can sound like you're at Finals form by early July. Like I said ... petty. :P

Of course, but what is the average age of the Cavs? 20? It's why I think it really depends how old you are in your rookie year. I would NOT let my 16-year-old (fictitious for the purpose of example) travel across country to join the Cavs in his first year. There's too much growing up to do there, and I would not want my son learning important things about becoming a man in a cloistered environment from college freshman and sophomores. Not at all an indictment on drum corps or the Cavs, just not what I consider the best possible environment. If you're out of high school and still a rook, things change. You don't want to linger in a DII corps or a B corps at that point if you have any major competitive impulses. I'd say shoot for the starts at that point. That's when I think traveling across the country to join a corps like the Cavs and traveling with people your own age can become a positive formative experience.

If you want to get technical, any time the snares or tenors use an eighth-note triplet skeleton for their rolls deserves at least a two-bar guzzle. That's just cheating. ;)

Oooh ... this could be good ... - Everytime a horn player does a fist pump after hitting a high note - Anytime the drum line does "monkey sticking" - Anytime someone in the pit is scene making "drummer face" during an intense part of the music. Two drinks of they're hitting a cymbal or a gong while making the face (not physically demanding, making the face completely unnecessary). - Anytime they cut to a guard member dropping something (it's uncanny, isn't it?). - Anytime the corps does "jazz running" for more than 8 beats in a drill. Two drinks if the cameras do a close up during the jazz runners, evoking images of Dave Barry's secondary title for speed walking (aka "walking like a dork").

I will give you the same advice my pastor gave me when I was trying to decide how badly I wanted to be married. He said, "Don't look for the girl you can't live without. Look for the girl you can live with." I think the same thing applies when looking for a corps. Lots of things matter: location, cost, competitive nature, ability to benefit, teaching ability of staff, likability of staff and members, touring rigors, etc. etc. etc. In the end, don't try and talk yourself into going someplace or another because you think the marching experience will be any different than your camping/audition experience. I suggest whatever you experience during camps/audition will be very much like what you experience during the season. Personally, I have little patience with caption heads who think their job is to float above and not interact individually with those they are charged to teach. I require personal interaction. It's a trust issue. I need feedback. But that's what was always important to me ... a bottom line factor. That said, there are certain things you can count on. For example, if you're a snare drummer in need of a challenge, a place like Concord is hard to beat. If I played contra, I think I would want to spend as much time as possible with Pat Sheridan of the Academy, but that's only because I know of his reputation. Sometimes the desire to be challenged trumps all else, and challenges come in many shapes and sizes. I know of a horn player that just flat out didn't like Cavs music style, but pursued them vigorously because he felt their athletic, all-male culture was more visually impressive (and thus an easier sell to his friends why he was spending his summers in "marching band"). He also felt it kept him in shape for fall football, where he ended up going to a D-II school on scholarship. I still wonder why someone looking for their rookie DCI experience isn't considering the local corps, which I'm assuming for you is Spirit. I think it's very, very difficult on DCI rooks to (a) make an out-of-town corps, especially one like Cavs (B) survive without being overwhelmed by the pace of learning, etc. I'm not at all suggesting Spirit is less demanding than Cavs or Crown, but being close to home definitely makes that first year experience much easier to swallow. Just being in a place where people tend to look, think, and act like you tends to make learning a little easier. Get a year under your belt and you'll probably look at the world a little differently, know yourself a little better, and maybe be a little more comfortable if you choose to audition for another corps. That's just my perspective. YMMV.

I think DCI has reached a point where it's almost impossible to make the shows more physically or musically demanding. The next step seems to me to go full ballet. I'm a drummer so I've always got my eye on the drum lines. I've never seen as much coordinated movement required from the lines as I have the past two years. They break up the battery so much anymore. Used to be you would never break up the snare line or the tenor line and especially not the bass line. Now it's so much more of an ensemble, as bass drummers are now playing stuff that was exclusively reserved for snares just 35 years ago. I'm curious how much more power show designers will get with the top corps looking for some new edge. Are we in an age where ballet and dance become a pre-req for making a top corps hornline? I think we're getting there. When you're talking 3 points separating 1 through 7, where else are you going to get the bump up? GE is 40 points. It's the biggie you have to win if you want the championship. I think all the narration with the Cadets was an early response to the nature of the heightened competition and the need to take more risks. It's hard anymore to find a challenging piece of classical or jazz that hasn't already been done -- and done well, complete with gorgeous arrangements and necessary tech marks. Even modern arrangers like Copland and John Williams are well worn. Who's going to take a risk on something new? I think the Cavs have established modern judges are open to something new if it's played and executed well.

Strange topic, but I'll give it a try. I'd probably do an entirely 80s corps because that's what I know the best ... High brass by ... 80s Scouts Low brass by ... 80s Star Guard by ... 80s Phantom Battery percussion by ... 80s BD Pit by ... 80s Cadets Music/Arrangement by ... 80s SCV Drill by ... 80s SCV Touch of attitude from ... 80s Velvet Knights Couldn't figure out how to work in Cavs, Spirit, Suncoast, or Troopers, but I'd figure something out. Maybe work out some crazy floating box drill with a bass drum line solo, followed by "park and blow" version of "Sweet Georgia Brown" and "Battle Hymn" as the closer.

I just had a nice phone conversation with the director of Jersey Surf and I came away very impressed. You meet some of the people in corps like that and you realize the only difference between them and the biggies is years of establishment and funding. There are some very talented people running corps this days!

Has anyone ever put Chick Corea's The Leprechaun on the field? Seminal drumming album. Probably Steve Gadd's best single work. There's some interesting stuff to work with there for everyone.