pitcorps

GO LOVETRUCK! Boston 00

I love clapping and strongly encourage freedom to clap, but I was disappointed that I couldn't hear the end of phantoms show before the cheers started. Such a gorgeous music moment went unheard.

Its ok for the marchers to listen forward to the pit. Their only tie came from playing a 105 minute show. They received first place. 7 times that night. The dr. beat listens to them for tempo.

All of scv 99, particularly when they are playing Barbers second symphony. Very tasty stuff. Beginning of Glassmen 2001. No keyboards but fantastic timbres. a true percussion ensemble moment. 06 Cadets early season they had the first minute or two of the show as a pit and vocal feature. Very impressive pit moment although the vocal controversy (i'm assuming) pressured them to take it out.

I understand where you're going with that and cleaner in the big picture should get higher numbers. What bugs me is that I've heard of critiques where corps A gets beat by corps B because corps B's show was easier and cleaner, while corps A gets beat by corps C because while their show was far dirtier, it was harder. I'm not saying it happens all the time, but it does happen and I don't get it.

I wasn't there to see shows last night, but unless gmen, colts and academy played 3 points worse in the evening show than in the morning show, yes, judges absolutely do this. <**>

Big mystery question here. Some nights I'll hear that corps x beat corp y because their execution was better with an easier show. Other nights I'll hear that corps a beat corps b because while their execution wasn't better, they had more demand. Is there any regulated control in judging that determines when demand makes up for dirt? The sheets certainly don't show anything that would make this consistant. If demand is worth that much, why doesn't a lower ranked corps make a nearly impossible show so that they get points for the demand? If cleanliness is worth so much, why don't the blue devils play mr. quarter note takes a stroll? I understand that by the end of a season, these things work themselves out normally and demand will place groups in their competitive bracket and cleanliness will rank them from there, but for june scores, corps who are notoriously dirty will beat cleaner shows because of more demand. I just don't get it.

Yep, and unless the amps are on the field in dekalb, that sound will just go under the stands.

Sure I love Dekalb, but man oh man. That has got to be one of the worst pit stadiums in dci. With the overhang being directly above the front ensemble, they may as well take the night off. Great stadium with lots of tradition? yes. Acoustically acceptable? nope.

You say this like the members don't want to be in the pit. Year after year, every corps has people come to auditions with one thing only in their mind. Making a spot in an oustanding pit. From the full corps competetive standpoint: Lets assume that you have ten super strong vets with great attitudes and dedication for the corps all return from the previous season for pit. Then, you get three auditionees that can play circles around anyone. Wouldn't it make sense to go with a thirteen person pit that season? It may be slightly larger than other groups, but in corps, you put your tallent where they will best serve the corps. If you have a very tallented pit, they can raise your percussion 1 and 2 scores, your GE music scores (a lot when judged by some portions of the judging community) and your Music ensemble scores dramatically. Are pits getting smaller? In some cases, absolutely yes. In 1999, two div 1 corps had 15 members in them (colts and spirit if i recall). These days, both of those groups have shrunk by three to five members a season. Do pits need to be smaller? IT ALL DEPENDS ON THE SHOW DESIGN. If a corps decides to play a show with lots of fast textured woodwind or string parts, you often need a pit to cover those parts. If a corps decides to play a show based off a percussion ensemble piece (see santa clara 00 - stained glass) you may need a fuller pit. However, if you were playing a show full of mellow lush chords with very few fast moving lines, please, take out a rack player and the xylo spot and give them to the low brass. Just keep in mind, that there is a lot more to orchestration than the fact that 64 people make a box. As for the idea that putting more people in a pit just makes it harder to clean, lets look at drum corps as an activity. More people in any section creates a larger margin for error. So, the argument that having large pits will be an unacceptable challenge due to clenliness would lead to the next opinion that would state that all snare lines should consist of one player. That's just silly. So, we get to the root of the problem: 1) you're not a major fan of the pit. cool. i'm not a watcher of drill. i let it slide, but i would rather have 135 musicians blasting out the best possible music with full lung capacity, but i'm not asking to change the activity because i don't care about one caption. 2) you don't like to see members of the pit move around: fine by me. it is becoming a much more common trend for one player to stay at one keyboard for the entire show. these members may get a less well rounded experience, but that doesn't bug me. new forum topic: i don't really like pits, and i wish that pit performers would stay centered around one instrument for their entire show

TWEEEEEEET! TWEEEEEE! MAKE WAY!!!! THESE CHILDREN ARE BEING PUNISHED!!!!

Favorite pit books of my years in the activity: 99 scv 00 scv 01 glassmen (took three years off from corps, so i don't know these books too well) 05 phantom 06 cadets

I would have to assume that the slide whistle is fitted in the percussionits arsenal due to the fact that it is almost never assigned definite pitches. Yes, definite pitches are involved, but not specified in general slide whistle playing. If clear melody or harmony were played on a slide whistle and not just the "sound effect", dci would have to rethink their allowence of this silly instrument.

from a competitive standpoint that makes no sense. a percussion 1 judge will normally only get to hear the pit from directly in front of them, where the amps make little sound difference. an unfortunate amount of percussion judges don't know tons about melodic percussion, so they'll make comments on the obvious - cleanliness and dynamic expression. if you remove the possibility of the performer playing dynamics that are noticable to the judge, you are taking away half the perc score. granted, corps isn't all about the score, but any staff that makes the dynamics happen for the kids doesn't have their priorities right. thats not to say that there won't be times in which the amps will need to be pushed higher or lower, but they will be largely based on ensemble texture and staging of the hornline, not musical expression and line. imo the point of amps is to help the pit blend with the ensemble with a quality sound. amps don't make sound quality improve, but it DOES give the performers an opportunity to improve their sound quality and still be heard. also, to say that there should not be someone who can actually hear what's coming out of the mic's to controll how the mic's sound is just silly. every stadium these kids play at is going to have a different feel to it, and needs to have the sound adjusted accordingly. otherwise, most pits will just be too loud all the time. from my experiences, the pit instructor will tell the member to play with the exact same dynamic expression every time. if it turns out that in a given stadium reacts in a way that makes the member sound too loud, then by all means, they should turn them down a little, but the member is not in a place to be able to judge how their sound will react coming through a speaker 50 yards away.

Exactly. The problem isn't pits. The problem is dci hasn't changed their microphone techniques. Don't complain to the corps about the fact that they wanted to "not sound bad at all" to the live performers. Complain directly to dci about their recording techniques.