corps8294

I still hate it.

With all the rain outs, close call lightning strikes, etc. what are some your memorable storm stories from shows and/or tours past? 1988. Horicon, Wisconsin. Star of Indiana was on the field and tornadic storm was fast approaching. As the wall clouds started to spin up above, the show announcer said "Star of Indiana, leave the field!" They kept going and a funnel started forming above with the wind really whipping up. The announcer said again, "Star of Indiana, leave the field!" After that, the drum major cut the corps off, pointed to the back of the field, and after that a sea of pink made quick business of vacating the field. 1989. Dubuque, Iowa. Corps busses parked on the grass at the top of a hill. Storm comes and hits hard. Lots of rain. Busses sink into the grass and a wrecker had to come pull them out. One bus tried to make it down the hill and slipped quite a bit. Many drum corps members, especially those from the Madison Scouts, were enjoying slipping and sliding down the muddy hill.

I've seen the show on the FN and I think it's a very well created WGI show that was developed for a drum corps. If they were to maximize a lot more of the field, like everyone else, I might like it. I still don't like the semi-skirts on the corps proper. Thank you for ditching those d**n die-nasties for a superior drum! The Pearls are awesome! P.S. Please, please, please bring back T.O. as an openner sometime!

If the weather is noncooperative, maybe they can have a standstill show at Joel Olsteen's mega-church. "All together, say it like you mean it..." Good grief.

bump

Wichita State, home of the Shockers! I'm sure the fans and students of that school have a lot of fun "using thier hands" to show thier school pride!

NYCFan makes some very good points and I'd like to continue on... The Crossmen first started to lose thier way before they headed down to cowpoke country. When they came out with Radar Love and Paradise By The Dashboard Light, that was big ol' "Oh! Oh!" right there. The 2005 corps still had the firepower and talent; but the product just wasn't there. In 2006, it got worse with the AM/FM radio show. Just flat out bad design all across the board. Again, in 2007, the corps made an attempt to tie in its roots with its new location; but the music choices and show design were very weak. And from there, that's when the Crossmen started to really lose thier way and thier punch. Sometimes the only way foreward is to look backwards; but backwards in a way to see what worked, was effective, was identifying, and didn't intimidate the membership in light of "certain music being sacred territory to the corps past." Everyone is well aware that the Crossmen had excellent success with Pat Methany music in the past; perhaps the best in the activity. However, there is more to the Crossmen than just Methany. Sure they dabled with the likes of Russian Christmas Music (which was also done quite well, by them); but I'm reminded of a slogan on thier 1989 tour shirt "High Velocity Jazz." To many, that's what the Crossmen were known for: high velocity jazz with sweet driving percussion, kickin' horn charts, and a dazzling metro feeling from the guard. What the Crossmen need is to perform a "best of show." Sure, they are attempting it with Methany; but go back prior to '91. How about coming out with another fierce arrangement of Summertime or Wind Machine? From there segway into a ripping arrangement of Caravan. To this day, nobody has been able to top the Crossmen's 1990 version of that classic. And as a closer, to show that they are progressing and looking ahead, while sticking to what worked and what the fans enjoy; find a new or newer piece of driving jazz. There are many great points made by many; hopefully, those on the Crossmen hierarchy will read some of these and take notice. And to add, my favorite Crossmen year of all time is 1987; they didn't even make top 12 that year!

I always liked the DCM announcer-Joe Bruno. Whenever I think of Crocker, I'm always reminded of..."Prize Patrol!"

It's, roughly, a two hour trip from La Crosse to the Twin Cities; so they all should get some good floor time before they prepare for the first major measuring stick show of the season. However, if you factor in "corps time travel;" it will be a three hour trip.

tick-tock, tick-tock...(puts in the Doyle Gammill Superjudge recording to pass the time)...tick-tock, tick-tock

I can't speak for '98, '99, and '00; but the '97 corps was far from pleasant. I was on staff with a corps that was competing against Tarheel Sun in '97 and what I observed was a corps that was arrogant, obnoxious, rude, and beaten down. I not only observed this amongst the membership; but the staff as well. There weren't too many throughout the Div II and III corps and the II and III hierarchy that were fond of Tarheel Sund that year. The last memory I have of that '97 corps was a member talking to a friend of her's from another organization, after retreat on finals night, and telling her that "she had to go now because they were all going to get yelled at for losing DCI." Pretty sad, isn't it. I've also heard quite a bit about Ira. The comments weren't positive.

That's awesome!

....that's way below the belt....the same as saying Cavies train their people to go to BD's truck and steal a uniform...remember THAT one? Well, there's all this talk about how PERFECT the Blue Devils are; everyone seems to think that they walk on water as compared to the rest of the corps in the activity.

2000 DCI Finals...

They are also good at training members to climb onto the equipment truck, grab thier uniform and instrument, and run out onto the field after they've been kicked out.

I'm really surprised at that with Aungst being at the helm and all. Must be the talent level.

Geez, and here I always thought it had something to do with the "smoke" that filled the air around the corps! That's a part of the Blue Devils image that I don't think will ever fade.

How big are the Mandarins and Seattle Cascades this year in terms of caption numbers? Big corps, smaller corps?

I still enjoy the Blue Stars show; however, after watching them last night, it's safe to say that they are in trouble. I believe they will have no problem making the Saturday show during finals week; but the hope and excitement for moving up a spot or two from their two year stay at 8th place is proving to be quite difficult. I fully expected to see a lot of growth and change from when I saw them a few weeks ago; but, it's still very, very dirty and the guard is terrible! This is definitely not the guard from the past couple of years, that's for sure. Here's hoping they can get this ship righted and find some salvage for this season. Great show; but needs quite a bit to at least acquire a three-in-a-row of 8th place.

Now, play Trittico next year and you'll win! '94 and '99 Blue Knights were awesome! Lovin' some Trittico!

If I recall correctly, the Blue Stars had a lot of age outs in the guard last year. I could be wrong. Although the guard is good, they don't seem to have the talent or fitness level that they've had the past couple of years. I really enjoy the Blue Stars this year; however, the overuse of props could possibly hinder thier progress onward and upward in the long run. If they are going to run with those at the top, they are going to have to mature beyond the crutch of props. I'm not 100% ready to hit the panic button on the Blue Stars, yet; however, they have a lot to explore this season and looking ahead to next year if they really want to move up toward the upper echlon.

Logan High School. Very nice facilities!

It will be interesting to see how far the show has come and what has changed since a few weeks ago at UW-L. Crown will be rehearsing two blocks from my place on that day. Might walk over and catch a Crown run through.

The top corps...yadda, yadda, yadda. The action seems to be taking place from 8th on down. Some corps that were in the middle of the top 12 are either, currently, up a spot or two; while one or more are sitting lower than they would have expected with all the preseason hype and such. Tick-tock, tick-tock, time will tell how things change.

The big shindig in the Twin Cities on the 17th should give a pretty good picture of how things are shaping up towards the home stretch as the bigger shows come up. Geez, the season has just begun and we're already talking about the home stretch of the season.