Geneva

Ditto

Wow, lots of great comments here! I agree with the OP that, indeed, the initial intent of amplification for the pit to help resolve balance and technical playing issues in fact did open a Pandora's box. How this evolved into the acceptability of the use of synthetic thunderous goo which obliterate the efforts of 16 tubas, I do not understand or appreciate. A good drum corps impact should be felt in the chest and not by the vibration of your toes! Oh, and by the way, now that we can hear the pit, please remove the visual clutter by placing them on the back sideline!

We are on the same wavelength here. In an outdoor activity (at least when the domed stadiums are not being used) I think the timbre of the G soprano is better suited to deliver the sound impact which has defined drum corps over the years. Sure, the trumpets can be played loud (e.g. BD, Crown, Cadets), but the breadth of sound is different. Indoors where you have the augmentation of the sound by the acoustical properties of the room this is probably less obvious and the superior pitch slotting of the trumpets wins out over the soprano. I have played them both for many years and there is no question that the trumpet is superior when it comes to the facility with pitch, but the well played G bugle (e.g. Hawthorne Cabs alumni) is a unique and exciting sound outdoors. I know that market pressures will prevent widespread use of G bugles from ever returning and I will miss that in competitive drum corps.

I just checked out their Allentown performance on the Fan Network. I am excited to hear how they are starting to sell this show. When I first heard the music at the Spring Fling, I was lukewarm on it. The selections were just unfamiliar enough to me that I did not immediately get it. The talent level and execution potential seemed to be there and while the movement of the music seemed to be compelling at times, I was just not getting where it was headed. When I first saw them perform in the gray unis it almost seemed like they were cutting their legs out from underneath them and slotting themselves into lower level of the top 12. However, now I am getting the flow, timing, and momentum of this show and the way it pops at the finale! I will be at Indy pulling for you. Go BAC!!

Delasalle had a beautiful soft chromatic short descending run and fade in Flamingo before they replaced it with Light My Fire which was also a great exit but different than this topic's question. I think it was 1969.

That would be great with me and so unexpected based on early season scoring. Must be the lobster power!

Thanks. It is nice to have a face, name, and background to associate with the great sound.

Thanks, it is always a pleasure to perform for an appreciative audience.

Thanks for posting so I could see what I missed. I wish that I could have stayed, but was just too tired after playing with the senior corps and uncomfortable from sitting out in the rain.

Did they play Conquest next?

While I am pulling for Boston's rise (pun intended) and I did not see their performance last night (gave up on the rain), I felt that Madison was flat.

Agreed!! She has a beautiful sound, style, and spot on intonation. Anyone know anything about her?

I think the change from G to B flat/multi-key was for a number of reasons with the market being the biggest factor and the reason that things will never return. Number one, as the number of participants in the activity decreased the demand for G bugles softened making it more difficult from a profitability standpoint for instrument manufacturers to supply what had become a niche market. But there are other factors such as the entry of main stream musicians and educators into the activity who were not comfortable with the different playing characteristics of these instruments particularly from the standpoint of the greater intonation challenges. Unfortunately for the drum corps purists, the trade off for instruments that slot better has been that they also have a narrower cone of sound and are more difficult to project with outdoors where drum corps usually perform. Speaking from the point of view of a trumpet player who played and is still playing on G sopranos, I feel that that the trumpet models in use by modern drum corps have projection characteristics which are better suited for indoor playing rather than the field. I know that there are trumpet makes out there with the freer blowing characteristics similar to G bugles. They are just not the Yamahas and other makes in current use by corps. If corps want a better emulation of G bugle responsiveness, they will have to utilize a different style of trumpet such as the Flip Oakes Wild Thing.

...and I never had the pleasure of seeing your corps, either. Somewhere though I have the Connecticut state championships from 1965. Elphaba, did you play on that one?

Right on. I am not sure where I got "The Man I Love" from, but Canadian Commanders did a great arrangement of this in 1966.

Have a great show! I would be there as in the past, but working.

Hey, Paul. Your story reminds me of a trip that I made with a drum corps buddy to the World Open in 1970. We left from upstate NY on the spur of the moment, no tickets or lodging, in my mom's station wagon. We arrived at Manning Bowl parking lot the evening before the prelims and unrolled our sleeping bags to sleep in the fold down section of the car so that we would be first in line for prime seats to the prelims the next morning. Well, we were awakened in the middle of the night by the Lynn police beaming their flashlights through the windows. We feigned sleep at that point surmising that a conversation with the cops was unlikely to result in an improvement in our accommodations for the evening. The great thing was that they turned off their flashlights and left us alone! They probably figured we were just harmless drum corps nuts...Ha! I have such great memories of the corps the next day from our 50 yard line seats. The precision of the Troopers, the rock solid horn line of 27th, and best of all the climactic OTL of the Boston Crusaders. We were in awe as Jim Centorino lit into his triple tongued solo and things just built and built to the triumphant finish of "Conquest"! Wow, I get chills up my spine just recalling this drum corps master production.

Great story about your Ithaca College digs, nice! I have been in those dorms and it is one spectacular view of the Cayuga valley, lake, Ithaca, and Cornell. I was down on the Schoelkopf field that day playing with the Purple Lancers. My most vivid memory was of the excruciating tension which we experienced as the prelims were delayed just before our performance by a cloudburst downpour. We were underneath the stands for what seemed like an eternity waiting to go on. That performance was the goal of the entire season, my last in competitive drum corps, as we made our statement that we belonged on the finals field that evening. We were successful in becoming New York's only DCI finalist in the past 41 seasons. What a great way to leave the marching shoes behind!

Thanks for coming! I enjoyed your performance. Sounds like you had quite the adventure.

Chuck, thanks for filling in the gaps.

OK, I listened to the recording and here is what I came up with: 1) Sounds to me like an original fanfare 2) The Man I Love 3) Bill Bailey 4) Invercargill March (we played this in the junior corps as well 1965 and 1966. Always one of my favorites. A British style march by a New Zealand composer, Alex Lithgow) 5) "America the Beautiful" theme color pre 6) ?? 7) Basin Street Blues (this was a noted showcase for BHOF bugler Ken Petersen. His rendition the year before at Mission Drums was captured by Fleetwood and is a drum corps classic) 8) Jezebel (we also did this in the junior corps in 1967 and other years. I always loved the passion and drive of this tune. The late Dick DeCola wrote a development interlude which I always enjoyed playing). 9) ?? 10) Apple Blossom Time (the corps' theme song as popularized by the Andrews Sisters).

I will ask around on my Appleknocker web site and see if anyone knows.

You are right about the Whaley Royce contra being heavy and cumbersome to march with since it was held out front rather than on the shoulder. However, the Appleknockers did use it on the field at least during the 1960 season. The contra was redesigned by Getzen in 1963 or 1964 to the present over the shoulder configuration and the rest is history...

True that. The upside is that I thought Surf's rendition was much more polished and musically balanced.