C4T

I would think the difference in size, both of the groups themselves and the size of the countries that they tour (if they even tour), might have something to do with it. Do brass bands have a "season"? Or are they year round for the most part? That could be a factor as well. No color guard in brass bands either... It's all the color guards fault ;-)

Tron: Legacy soundtrack. Blue Devils or Bluecoats as they are staff and uniform-wise.

*cough http://www.drumcorpsplanet.com/forums/index.php/topic/99044-drum-corps-youtube-videos/ cough*

I thought this was an interesting idea, so I decided to apply a version of the points system to the 2010 regional and finals week scores. 1-23 points for San Antonio (surf did not appear at this show, so I gave them 1 point for simplicity's sake), Atlanta, Allentown and Quarters, 1-17 for Semis, and 1-12 for Finals. The only corps that would have been in different positions from these results are BK and Scouts, with BK only edging them out by a single point due to their relative success at the earlier shows.

The maximum member limit was only upped by 15, not 30. Just being nitpicky It could be argued that many of those 15 who can now march their "dream corps" wouldn't have marched anywhere else had they not made it in. Great points about the weight thing though, that's something I hadn't considered or seen mentioned before.

To be on topic, I always enjoyed making a sack lunch during breakfast at winter camps

I was going to be more specific with that part of my post but my post was already longer than I liked. I meant as long as they're not being charged a camp fee that appears to be for providing meals, which would tie in with "as long as the members know what to expect from the camp." I totally agree with you on the other costs involved with running a camp. If there's a camp fee, as long as there's no illusions about what that's paying for, that's fine.

A great, and valid question. Wish I had an answer for you, just wanted to offer my support in getting your actual question answered instead of getting derailed by this "it's wrong not to feed them!" talk. :-)

If a corps doesn't provide meals, as your quote says, the members are on their own and I don't see anything wrong with that as long as members are made aware of it beforehand and they aren't being charged some kind of camp fee. Actually, this approach makes more sense to me than having the corps provide food, especially for audition camps. It also could make more financial sense for corps that don't know how many members/students will be at any given camp. Mandatory registration helps, but I'm not sure how many corps have that kind of process in place. Again, as long as the members know what to expect ahead of time and are given sufficient break time, I don't see anything wrong with them having to be on their own for food during winter camps.

Does it matter if fans notice the specific change? Do most fans even notice a majority of any changes, be it rules, uniforms, mouthpiece size, mallet choice, brand of marching shoes, type of paint used for the drum major's podium etc. each year? No rule changes will eliminate human error, so of course there can/will still be balance issues, but this allows more tools that can be used to reduce those issues. How is there anything negative about that?

Is it assumed that the change would be effective immediately upon passing since there is no mention of time in this proposal? If so, very good point. I hope that doesn't keep it from being passed, as the corps who do take advantage of it will be able to create a better product for the audience.

Sounds more like a phenomenon... Of cool.

Cavaliers

One had a lot more female members.

so perhaps it could be said that solely dot marching is possible to get results, solely form marching isn't... at least at some point in the learning process, dot marching must be used.

Again, I'm not entirely sure what the method is at BK since 2009, nor do I know if it has ever been solely dot marching. I just brought up to a friend that it seemed like there wasn't very much emphasis on dressing the form between sets and they confirmed that for me, which leads me to believe they are primarily dot based. Could be wrong. Thanks for your insight on Cavies and SCV! Like I said in my earlier post, if it gets to be perfect, it's perfect, no matter which method or combination of methods is used. Their execution shows that they are mature enough and/or the staff is persistent enough to maximize the design individually (or approach that, anyway). A lesser corps (member or instruction-wise) would not be able to achieve the same. On the other side of things, if the forms are perfect, does it necessarily matter that they are in the absolute correct positions on the field as it was written on paper? No, the judges and the audiences don't have the drill charts to compare and determine that kind of error.

On average, I'd say everyone's show deserved an average entertainment score. To answer the question for real, there were parts in every show in the top 12 that I found entertaining, and other parts that I found boring, but any show that at some point gets me to care what the performers are doing, they've achieved entertainment regardless of the specific emotion (anger, joy, sadness) is meant to be portrayed.

ha, nice

I have asked someone from BK, and my opinion on the topic was confirmed. This was back before Marc Sylvester coming on board, I haven't watched as much BK since to note if there has been a noticeable difference as far as transition forms go. But enough about that, I don't want to come across as bashing BK or anything. I should have said that focusing solely on dots can make for very dirty looking drill, because its focusing only on what is written on the paper which is only the "key frames" if you will. Any strong, clean visual program will utilize aspects of dot and form marching, or do one of the two very, very well. On paper (heh) dot marching should result in perfect forms if everyone's tempo and pacing are perfect, but that is very hard to achieve. If Cavaliers use solely dot marching (I don't think they do) they are successful because they are able to near that perfection. Less mature corps are not. The advantage of form marching is that active corrections are taking place at all times. It may not always be what is exactly on the page, but it will appear clean even if there are mistakes (mistakes which ideally the audience will be unaware of due to the active corrections). This method requires just as much awareness and concentration as the other, and both methods at their peak should yield identical results in theory.

Like Howdy has said, I feel like dot emphasis marching results in clean pictures as written on the page, but dirtiness (in general) in all of the counts between pages. Blue Knights most years is an example, I believe, of the dirtiness of the dot emphasis method, most apparent any time there are rotating "straight" lines. I say "straight" because at the checkpoints they are for the most part spot on (dot on?) but the counts inbetween the lines warp. The ESPN broadcast from 06 where they freeze framed the one swastika drill move in BK's show is one example of this. No offense to BK, they sound wonderful, but their ensemble visual cleanliness has been sub par (2009 and earlier, I haven't seen the 2010 show from box angle on video yet).

Also, I think how some would approach the interpretation of this caption, it might was well just be called "The Real Winner Caption"

I skipped a few pages of posts so I apologize for repeating any ideas that have already been put out there or discussed... It seems to me that this is basically just another judge added to "smooth out" the GE scores. This is already taken care of by the double GE panel. The last part of the proposal mentions that the judging panel would instead be two GE judges (instead of 4) and the one Entertainment judge. This might save money for the major shows, but wouldn't it cost more for other shows that would otherwise only have the two GE judges? (I may be mistaken if more than just the major shows have the double GE panel currently) If anything needs to be done as far as "entertainment" factored in to judging, just emphasize it more on the existing sheets. If entertainment is in such short supply, I think the corps themselves would hopefully notice simply from the lack of merchandise being bought by fans. Another thing is that judging "entertainment factor" can be just as designer-reward-centric as the current system... An issue I think many might perceive as being alleviated by this proposal. A corps can't be "entertaining" if they don't have an "entertaining" show to perform no matter how well they perform it. Yes, it would be great of some corps didn't put out terrible messes of shows some years, but will adding this caption really keep that from happening? I don't think so. In all, I don't think the addition of this caption would impact the activity in any measurable way, and therefore should not be implemented.

I don't think I was trying to disprove yours or anyone's point... Just wondering if the same people who are offended by 'marching band' being used to explain drum corps would be just as offended if someone used 'drum corps' to explain marching band. Now a separate point, it seems like some are operating under the assumption that all drum corps are inherently of better quality than all marching bands which just isn't true. Show someone the last place open class corps (or any number of startup corps that aren't even in DCA or DCI yet) and then the BOA champion of the same year, and ask them which you think was a better product. Anyway, some of the most loved musical groups of all time are bands. Queen is a band. The Beatles were a band. Metallica.... well, you get the idea. It's that pesky "marching" word that's the problem

How would you explain marching band to someone who only knows what drum corps is? Would anyone be just as offended to say something like "marching band is like drum corps but with woodwinds"?

It's like a travelling circus filled with brass players, percussionists, a color guard and the ring leader we call the drum major. There are bright colors, costumes, theatrics, feats of skill and strength, and the occasional house of mirrors.