warsawstory

I guess four years is a long time. Both the Colts and Cadets participated in the last inaugural parade.

Alexander Nevsky? Fire of Eternal Glory? Tchaikovsky Serenade?

1986 27 Lancers Sondheim Suite. There's a very poor quality high-cam video on youtube. I would really like to get some behind the scenes info on how challenging it was to make such a drastic stylistic change.

Yikes! So it will be a show I enjoy listening to, much like '88 Spirit of Atlanta? (and I know you're kidding, right?)

Personally, three of the non-finalist corps entertained me more than some of the finalist corps. I do imagine a "what could have been" scenario with the Oregon Crusaders. They blew me away with a very original, imaginative and entertaining show. I just wonder how high they could have placed had they participated in a longer tour. The design and talent certainly wasn't lacking.

I see that Pioneer is branching out and planning camps in North Carolina and perhaps New York. Also, they are going in a different musical direction in 2013. You've got to respect them for stepping a bit out of their comfort zone. Hopefully, their endeavors will be fruitful. Check out their revamped website and VOTE!

Did you vote today?

Vote! It is so easy. Link to your facebook page.

How does Nite Express fit into all this?

Juliet! She really got her act together over the course of the Summer.

A solo act?

The person who posted that comment lacks basic math skills.

I think some big unison moves might impress middle school kids. Rotating blocks, unison guard work.

I would love to see those gerrymandered districts!

Thanks to everyone who has responded to this thread. I've been assembling information on different recruiting techniques and would like to eventually send them off to a corps director. Here are some more ideas I was mulling over. Have at 'em. Offer to make lunch for a H.S. marching band that might be pulling an all day Saturday rehearsal. A corps food truck would be an impressive sight and corps certainly have experience putting out food. What kind of a budget would you be looking at for lunch? You could post a typical corps rehearsal day on a whiteboard to give the kids an idea of what to expect. I feel many college band directors are touchy about having corps recruit their marching bands members. Here's a way around that - Get in touch with the music fraternities on campus and offer to do a pizza party/recruitment session, thus avoiding a director who turns his/her nose up at marching drum corps. What other kind of "out of the box" ideas can you come up with?

Thanks for the correction. I should have consulted Corps Reps instead of relying on my memory.

Thanks for the response. Is this competition held in Metro Denver? If you were to ask a student in xyz marching band if they were aware of who is sponsoring the competition, could they give you an answer? Do they know that there are performance opportunities beyond high school marching band? That's what piques my curiosity.

Personally, I think your response is a bad analogy. Drum corps, unlike college football, is a niche activity. College football has way more money to send recruiters out to scout prospective players. Perhaps you're missing my point. I just feel that some corps are waiting for prospective members to come to them. I choose to use Pioneer and Spirit as examples because they are located in markets with which I am familiar. Both have a huge base for potential recruits within an easy commute to camps. Spirit has metro Atlanta and Pioneer has Southeastern Wisconsin and Northern Illinois. Maybe I choose the wrong corps to compare. I guess what it boils down to is what would be a fun, creative, economical way to get potential members to choose a corps within commuting distance rather than spending loads of money flying to camps once a month? That's what troubles me.

I'm a big ole fat, honkin', loud-mouth former Christian and I loved Cadets 2012 show. Seriously, it's the first show that got me choked up since, Goddesses forbid, Regiment's 2010 "Into the Light" show. Cheers to Cadets for taking a risk.

I see that corps are gearing up for the 2013 season. Most audition camps start at 8:00 p.m. on Friday night of camp week-ends. What would happen if a corps (Pioneer or Spirit for the sake of argument) focused their recruiting efforts within a three to four hour drive of their camps? If some potential members wish to make it to camps from beyond that radius, fine. What is do-able by hopping in a car with a couple people and driving to camp? I'm just using these two corps as examples as they both have large populations within that three to four hour radius and I am familiar with both cities. The reason I'm asking is because I have the impression most corps are not making an effort to recruit locally. Why? Should recruiting locally matter? Am I totally off base? I guess I'm curious to see what would result from a recruiting effort that was "locally" based. Yes, Spirit is a finalist corps. I realize my topic headline makes the inference that Spirit was not a finalist.

It's about time a corps revisited the music of Lerner and Loewe. The only corps to do an entire production based on their songbook (to my knowledge) has been Suncoast Sound and Pioneer.

Pioneer - Throw some Bluegrass into your show. After all, it is a derivation of Irish music. Or exploit your South African connection by choosing something from Hugh Masekela's or Miriam Mekeba's discography.

Don't forget Richard Strauss.

Huge jump for Pioneer. Thursday is going to be interesting. Phantom Regiment! I really think they can pull off a silver.