Scerpella

I'm not following closely on this, but didnt they just lose their long time visual designer?

Looking forward to seeing this production Friday in Madison. To be honest the announcement that they were doing PAAE was not loved by me. It's good to learn that it is not a straight classical treatment like previous corps like 72 Kilties did. I suppose I should know by know that this crew specializes in making disparate music fit together. Last year didnt bode well either, until of course I saw it.

I thought that Cadets2 were going to have an upper age limit of 24? Not really digging this. DCA should disallow corps who superimpose an age limit. The place for this corps is in DCI Class A (or whatever its called now)

Seriously, talk about a poor value for the cost of the ticket. June 20th is awfully late for not having the whole show done.

It is great to see John recognized but what is unfortunate about the DCI piece is that it doesn't mention John's formative influences in the Spectacle City Mariners, which he marched with as Drum Major (Capn Crunch) and was corps director from 71-74, and the championship Mariners Winterguards he put out at that time before arriving in Rockford in 1976. It is safe to say I think that without the Mariners and even St Gregory the Great Drum Corps where John got his start, there is no John Brazale of the Phantom Regiment. Great to see the Mariners legacy live on (in a small way) through the rededication of this award.

G French Horn bugles have been featured to great effect in the past. Couple of examples from my corps Madison Scouts, 1971 Alice in Wonderland show, 1975 Rhapsody in Blue, 1976 Stars and Stripes Forever. 1977 most of the show was Kenton's WSS, ironically the FH's were playing the Mellophonium parts, listen especially to the closer "Somewhere", 1973,73,78 God Bless the Child. 1980-81 Ice Castles. The former arranger and creator of their signature sound Ray Baumgart, used to utilize the FHs often as lead baritones

Sorry I simply reject this idea that Kilties are any more guilty of hating criticism than anyone else. I have been on DCP since 02 before I joined the Kilties and for a long while I spent entirely too much time here. Kilties like everyone else occasionally piped in to register comments. And the usual suspects immediately start lighting their hair on fire. Its complete bs. Then someone always joins in with the completely unsubstantiated anecdote about this kiltie or that kiltie doing something which upset someones sensibility which they heard about from some friend at a show but didnt actually see themself. I think it's because of the bad feelings remaining from prior to 2000. I think the first few years of Kilties Sr they were alot like Kilties Jr. Basically bad a*s*ses who didnt care who they ###### off. The DCA establishment here holds a grudge like a Serbian, they never let it go. So every comment from someone from our corps is met with the same overreaction. I watched seasons go by with this corps or that corps refighting battles from 20 years ago about some perceived slight. Let someone from Kilties opine and people (usually the aforementioned) lose their minds. If someone chooses to like Kilties less because of my comments someone who is not marching nor is a representative of the corps, well that is pretty effing silly but so be it.

Well you will have to lead me to this mystical utopia where negative comments about a corps are not answered by corps members, or where every eastern corps member is perfectly in agreement with what there placement was, because its not DCP. There is plenty of flaming going on around here and most of it has nothing to do with the Kilties.

Agree. I've never understood people deciding they don't like this or that organization because a person or persons reflects their personal opinion on a forum. Were that the rule after years on DCP I would dislike every competing group.

Seems like a pretty good fit to me.

For 7 years with the Kilties I had an opportunity to see MBI 3-4 times every year. This first year not marching the only time I saw them was at DCI Minn and it was clear that this show out of many great shows over the years had everything they needed to take the top spot. Last years too could have taken it as well, didnt agree with the 2nd place finish, but one just got the impression they would not be denied this year.

Top Class A corps outscoring the bottom Open Class corps has happened before. Didnt DCA rules formerly put that corps into the top 10 performance? The decision was made a couple years back that Open Class and Class A compete in separate divisions. The question to me is that when judges are doing their rate, rank and ? (I forget what the three tasks were according to Tom Peashey) are they ranking Class A against all corps or just Class A? If you look at the DCI model, no one would argue that Open Class corps in DCI are scored on the same scale as World Class..

One would think by your reply that every word about Kilties is met with a response when in fact for the past few years the corps typically remains largely radio silent until after the season is over. Part of the reason for this is replies like yours which seem to ignore the rest of the arguing that goes on for the other 10 months of the year. And the reasoning you display that because some members and fans do respond to comments with which they don't agree, you should hate the corps. I don't know anyone with the opinion you speak of that DCA is trying to fold the Kilties. Its true that continued poor placement affects junior corps financials negatively, but Kilties are pretty solid in that department. Basically I don't agree that push back from Kilties supporters is any more or less than any other corps. The current corps philosophy and leadership means that the emphasis will probably remain the same. Hopefully in the coming years there will be something about the shows you like, assuming of course you haven't written them off because of a few people you disagree with.

To be fair, there are only a couple people (myself included) who respond to negative comments about the Kilties over the past few years. So blaming Kilties because a couple former members take issue with some criticisms, seems awfully silly. But I hope you don't mean to imply that no one else on DCP takes issues with statements made about their favorite corps? Because that would be truly silly.

Having prelims broadcast on Fan Network was a great thing and technically there were few problems with it.

Your comments might concern me if you werent getting into it regularly with people from other corps as well. If somebody writes something which criticizes another group however well intentioned, expect someone to respond. Using your own philosophy, if you dont want to get into arguments with others, dont post critical things about other peoples groups. I think most people know that in a discussion forum, people are going to discuss. Free speech is a 2 way street. As for the Kilties are always complaining malarkey, the one time a year anyone from Kilties says something the usual suspects with no sense of proportion or perspective comeback with the silliness you just wrote. Listen you criticize ANY corps on this forum and someone is going to respond, and it happens a lot more with other corps than the Kilties. The fact you would blow up this infrequent occurrence as somehow different or worse than anyone else just confirms to me you are one of those with a bug up their butt. So just to be clear, we won't be getting a Christmas Card from you this year? How will we ever survive?

Ed that is a completely arbitrary number. Yeah nowadays there aren't many corps in World Class, but in 72 the first year of DCI there were 39 corps vying for 12 spots. In your reasoning this would translate to 3 corps in DCA Open Finals.

So there is no confusion here, I am not a representative of the Kilties simply a former member with my own opinion. I was very happy for the corps making it in this year as I marched for 7 years without that success. You are certainly entitled to express your opinion whatever it is as I am mine. I did watch the Fan Network broadcast so its clear that at least a few people seemed to enjoy Kilties performance. Its a little disappointing that your review appeared to paint a completely negative picture.

Well what would we do if we couldnt discuss drum corps?? lol

Using that reasoning the only corps that can truly feel a sense of accomplishment are the 4-5 who beat lots of corps as opposed to the bottom 3 who would have beaten much fewer. In any case the final outcome does not determine whether something was a contest or not. Numbers 9 and 10 may have only ended beating 1 or 2 corps but by virtue of getting the chance to perform in the finals the possibility still existed that they would improve their position.

Right now the present structure (to me) serves to gives everyone a chance to see corps from all over the country who they dont usually get to see and like in any tournament see who is the best over the duration of the tournament. Positions do change from day 1 to day 2 (not much admittedly but that is a product of the present day subjectiveness of judging) and groups get more than one shot to put their best show on the field. So prelims is not just to see who the top 10 are but to give the groups a chance to jockey a little. For this second objective which for me is the more important one, a higher number in finals makes it more sporting. (for lack of a better term.) The truth is that prelims arent really necessary in any way in an activity where everyone can compete against everyone else in the same event. They could simply start the show an hour earlier and run everyone through and declare the national champions. But a true tournament provides the opportunity for corps to max out their show or even fail on the second day. The tournament model doesnt fail because there are less participants.

What is gained by that? Doesnt seem to me to be the act of an organization that wants to grow. Seriously why have Nationals at all?

Its about what was said awhile back about what does being in finals mean to some people. Some want to reduce the number of finalists which confuses me. Apparently to them it means that in order for them to feel elite they have to exclude others who meet criteria which were formerly valid for inclusion. Whether 7-10 perform in the night show or not, 1 thru 6 arent going to be any more elite than they already are. Excluding other corps doesnt enhance them. Its a very strange mindset to me that there are some for whom being a top corps is not enough unless it means they can prevent other corps from even getting to compete. I assume there will come a day when the economy turns around or some other demographic shift occurs and there will once again be more corps competing in Open Class prelims. Narrowing the amount of corps that compete in finals will as has already been said, guarantee that some corps are not going to spend the money to participate. If one goes back to the VFW days for junior corps, you immediately note that most years no more than 18-20 corps actually made the trip to VFW Nationals at a time where there were probably 250+ corps competing in their local circuits.. Cost is a prohibiting factor in this activity, both Sr and Jr. If you add the certainty that someone is going to come from a considerable distance and not have any chance at finals, then there is a much higher likelihood they will not make the effort.

Biggest amount of space devoted to what she didn't like about Kilties who finally made a final! Some things never change.

That is my suspicion as well. There remain to this day people who still have a bug up their butts about how the Kilties came into DCA in the 90's. Well this is a completely different corps for some time now and the Kilties have done everything that they can to prove they are a serious organization committed to competitive excellence in DCA. To those people I say let it go already.