OdeToArsenal47

Montreal and Dallas

When picking a corps song, the management has to pick something that coincides with the mentality of the corps. Rather than having a mission statement that you put on a t-shirt or on the side of a truck, you instead state your mission with your music. What better way is there to personify a drum corps than through music? With that, ever since the three Cold War Productions corps were born, they have contemplated their personalities. The head of the organization told each corps director, all alumni from the same corps, to put together a corps with a staff that had one clear idea on how they wanted their corps to be. The Cosmonauts wanted to innovate at lightspeed, dancing on the border of innovation and insanity, perhaps even going into unorthodox methods to be a leading force in the evolution of the marching arts. The Cosmonauts are changing the rules on what should be played and how it should be played. The Patriots wanted to provide a great blend of traditional and modern drum corps. Another goal of The Patriots was to become the most patriotic and American corps on any circuit today. They only play music from American composers and institute the American flag into all shows. The Iron Curtain (formerly Human Wave Regiment) have gone through identity issues but now have decided on their identity, with their new name. They wish to provide young upstart teenagers in the southwest a cheap and easy way into the drum corps world. Dues average around $800 and the corps has an average age of 16. They also provide a great stepping stone into the larger corps, with discounted tuition to The Cosmonauts and The Patriots and offer discounted transportation to Philadelphia and Murfreesboro. With that, each corps' staff has selected the corps song. This was tossed around at the November camp for each corps and each auditionee was asked for suggestions on a corps song. Eventually each corps has come to a decision and announced them at the December camp yesterday. The Cosmonauts will be using "Space Oddity" by David Bowie as their corps song. It may perhaps be an unorthodox choice, but this song relates to the repertoire selections by the corps (every program so far has used a rock band's music), the corps' name and the unorthodoxy of the corps. The Patriots will be using the "Marine Corps Hymn". They have selected this song, the oldest song in the United States Military, to reflect the undying spirit of The Patriots and their native land. The Iron Curtain will be using "Baba O' Riley" by The Who. Suggested by the returning drum major for The Iron Curtain, taking its hints from the lyrics "Teenage Wasteland" as a joke, it caught on by the staff. Eventually it was unanimously selected by the staff and garnered a 70% vote by the corps members. This corps song is special as it contains 2 solos. Stay tuned, for CWP will have a Christmas present: Tour announcements and accompanying maps!

I've been seeing these pop up more recently lately. I saw it in Vanguard and I saw it in a few marching bands (the first one coming to mind is Kennesaw Mountain HS in Georgia). I'm talking about corps/band exiting the field during the show. Call me a traditionalist, but it just seems, I dunno, anticlimactic. One of the great things about performing is watching the crowd cheer and all that. Going an entire season without truly facing your crowd, that sounds like it sucks TBH. What do you think?

Good luck MCDC! I can't wait to see you guys at Murfreesboro this summer!

Good luck Pioneer! I really hope to see you guys push forward this year!

I can see some changes being made before going into LOS to accommodate the echo. It's like the World Series. If you're playing the world series at Fenway, you need a good right fielder and a left fielder with a good arm. If you're playing at Minute Maid Park in Houston, you need a hell of a center fielder because of how deep it is. On offense, if you're at Fenway, you're going to want good power leftys and good contact rightys (short right field, green monster is fair territory). You've just gotta play to your advantage. That's one of the cool things about drum corps, you constantly have to be on your guard. You may not be playing a team heads up, one-on-one on the same field, but you have to battle your environment, your field, your show.

I'm all for a revolving championship. Year A: Southeast (Nashville, Orlando, Tampa, New Orleans, Raleigh, Miami) Year B: Northeast (Boston, New York, Baltimore, DC) Year C: Midwest (Chicago, Indianapolis, Kansas City) Year D: Southwest (Texas, VEGAS!) Year E: West (California, Seattle, Portland) Something like that. As long as everybody gets the love (I'm looking at you, west coast).

Call me crazy, but I'm the opposite. When it is pulled off correctly, it's awesome. It's like watching a play, then getting your face melted by some awesome music. And there is no greater potential for GE than through the whole storytelling thing through characters. Spartacus' ending will go down in history as one of the greatest endings to a drum corps show of all time.

Whoops, double post.

I couldn't imagine the competition When I became DM of my high school band, I competed against 5 other people. I still felt like it was really hard. I couldn't imagine 28! Knowing they're only going to take 3.

Phantom says ~250 auditioning for brass, somewhere in the 20s range for conductors.

Colts use Yamaha for everything, I believe. I know they use Yamaha pit and horn stuff. Scouts use Yamaha horns and frontline stuff, not 100% sure about battery. Pioneer uses King for brass, Pearl for drums, Zildjian for cymbals.

Most elaborate salute contest!

Call me a non-purist/hippy/etc., but I like their current uniforms.

No go. I wiped it down with a paper towel and rolled up the paper towel to wipe out the casing. They were spotless. Still really stubborn though.

I thought I did, I'll try that again and report back in a sec.

I feel like there is probably something dumb that I'm missing, but I can't get the valves in at all. They were really slow so I took them out (first mistake ) and oiled them up. I put it back in, moved it up and down until it was moving quickly and then started rotating it in. I read that I'm supposed to hear a click but I didn't and it just tightens up. Then the screw on the top of the valve doesn't go all the way down for me to screw on. I'm afraid to push the valve down because I feel like I'm forcing it. It's like this for all of the valves, so I don't think it's broken, I'm just doing something wrong. Anyone have an idea what this saxophone player's doing wrong? Perhaps I should just hand it to a brass guy?

From wikipedia, The word 'toast' became associated with the custom in the 17th century, based on a custom of flavoring drinks with spiced toast. The word originally referred to the lady in whose honor the drink was proposed, her name being seen as figuratively flavoring the drink. The more you know.

With no bias... -Synthesizers -Amped up pit -150-piece corps -Voice Narration -80-piece hornlines or thereabouts Can't think of much more.

BK, Blue Stars and Cadets are updating their twitters throughout the weekend.

Murfreesboro's back to one night? I don't get to watch Madison or Colts.

*sigh* Life = too busy. AP Classes are the death of me. Anywho, here's my announcements for The Iron Curtain! *** The Iron Curtain is looking to make a splash this season! The corps formerly known as Human Wave Regiment lost about half of the corps to higher tier corps, leaving the corps with a new identity and a tough job of not only surviving a rebuilding year but thriving! The corps held 3 audition camps in Oklahoma and Texas. While the corps wasn't able to reach their target number of 85 members, they are excited to see such youth. The average age of the corps is 16 years old! The locations of TIC's 2 camps were University of Tulsa, Tulsa, Oklahoma (Corps Headquarters) Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas After these two camps, The Iron Curtain has confirmed their membership for Season XIII with 72 members. But before we get into specifics, we want to show you The Iron Curtain's new uniforms! The uniform was designed to portray the shades of opinion in the Cold War. There were the extremes of black and white, but there were many that mixed in between East and West, choosing to side with no one. The jacket utilizes a very abstract design, to go along with the direction the corps likes to go, design-wise. The staff hopes that this uniform provides a good face for the corps both this season and in the summer season, before they decide to update it. *** This corps packs a punch with sound, being one of the loudest corps under this staff's regime! This group will certainly have to be ready for one of the most demanding shows in this corps' short history! Here are the finalized corps numbers. Total Members: 72 Drum Majors 1 Executive Drum Major 2 Assistant Drum Majors Hornline 32 Total 8 Contrabasses 8 Euphoniums 7 Mellophones 9 Trumpets Battery 16 Total 5 Snare Drums 5 Bass Drums 3 Quads 3 Cymbals Front Ensemble 11 Total 5 Mallet Players 1 Timpani Player 3 Accessory Players 2 Electronic Accessory Players Colorguard 10 Members, equally versed on flags and rifles *** The Iron Curtain will be partnering with these people for Season XIII. For brass instruments: For all drums and drum accessories: For all drumsticks and mallets: For marimbas, vibraphones, bells, chimes, xylaphones, timpanis and toms: For all cymbals: For all electronic equipment: *** And that's all until December, when tours will be announced for the season! See you then!

Agreed about the DM. Well, maybe not the butt gyrations, but definitely the conducting style. To quote a friend of mine, "He got dem Shakira hips!" I kid, I kid.

Churchill is a western pig.

...touche, good sir.