Glenn426
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Posts posted by Glenn426
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So this might have been predicted before, but I think the Covid year will have some slight but noticeable affects on the competitive order.
Generally those Corps that pounded on an keep going last year and fielded a full tour and corps will be ahead of the curb, compared to those that reduced or did not field competitive corps last year.
It has been an absolute trend in the rest of the marching arts and I don't think DCI will be immune to this.
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2 hours ago, craiga said:
I stand corrected....Boston has 80 brass. Looks like the guard is around 50.
Is that then 10 Tubas 16 Mellos
They mentioned having 26 Trombones in the Design piece so that leaves 28 Trumpets?
Are those the standard Brass numbers these days?
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16 hours ago, craiga said:
So, I made it to Castleton this afternoon. I recently retired from my job, and it is an amazing feeling of freedom that I can relax and enjoy the corps without having to even think about when I need to go home. That said, everything here is exactly as you would expect. The corps IS full, with no holes and morale is sky high. There seems to be 72 brass, 9/5/5 battery, a large front ensemble, and a massive, extremely experienced guard. Cool day today...barely 60 with a wind, but mostly sunny. This is year 6 for this senior staff, so it was awesome arriving here today and being greeted by the usual cast of characters. This, seriously, is comfort food, and as I get older, I'm not taking any of this for granted.
That sounds like an amazing Retirement plan. One that I aspire too.
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It's been my belief for a couple of years now that the future of Marching Arts is going upscale and professional. Taking the space left empty by Cirque De Soleil and taking that forward. Less Weekday shows and spending weekends at Heavy Metro Areas that can sustain 2 or 3 shows for the weekend. Move the Stage from the Football field to indoor Basketball Arenas.
Make The governing body own the Sound and Lighting equipment and have each corps use the same equipment just with each Corps using their own "Mix" to meet the demands of the show.
There is an Upscale "Broadway" "Theater" "Orchestral" Market that DCI has not tapped into and if the product is professional could very well demand 2- 3 times the amount per ticket. And lets face it, that crowd is not going to do anything outside in the middle of Summer in Cornfield Nebraska. You have to cater to your audience.
Cut your cost in Half. Triple your Revenue. What Blast started but never finished.
It would keep the activity alive and give a Creative evolution to the sport that we all know and love.
In it's current state, the leadership in DCI lacks that vision. From the Ashes of DCI this is what will Rise I reckon.
Someday...
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Late to the Convo here but It has to be Michael Gaines. He was hip and Fresh in 2000 and he is hip and Fresh now. He has the distinction of knowing how to stage Guard really really well. His work in WGI keeps him at the Apex of Trends within the Guard world and he understands how to manipulate and stage Hornlines properly.
His work speaks for itself.
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3 hours ago, Quad Aces said:
Looks interesting!
When and how did it get easier to get the rights to Maslanka’s stuff? For a while I thought getting rights from him was almost as difficult as getting rights from Bernstein’s estate these days.
David Maslanka came to work several times with Flanagan HS before his passing. For the Traveler, and A Child's Garden of Dream Movement V. I remember during those trips the conversations where had with David and his son that some of his more aggressive pieces would make excellent transpositions to the Marching field. They did not gave any indication then but did not say no.
Since David's passing in 2017 his Son Matthew took over and apparently has taken a liking to the idea of that.
I believe this is the first Drum Corps to perform Maslanka?
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The Maslanka Piece that you really want to listen too which will prob garner the most source material is Movement V of the Child's Garden of Dreams. AMAZING Source Material and it makes a phenomenal Opener.
The Bad Hombres Piece is percussion Heaven. Killer Source material which should translate nicely onto the field. Judging by the little clip of the drums shown yesterday it already has.
The Ending of Symphony 7 is majestic. Mixed with Lacrimosa some epic stuff there.
Really getting an Angels and Demons vibe from the source material. I'm sure this staff won't be as literal as that but, man does the Guard have alot to draw from if they want to.
I really like the direction the staff took in which they decided what the Field would look like and them built out from there.
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Hi Ladies and Gents. A new season is upon us. For those in the know, Are the Broken City guys still involved with Boston?
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30 minutes ago, JimF-LowBari said:
I was responding to mic’ing large sections of the corps to be clear....
In this regard then, While I was at Boston Buffalo Ensemble Rehearsal this past August, They were working a section of the ballad where the Mellos where on side 1 and had a soft melodic line that required delicate playing and soft smooth dynamic transitions.
Some of the players started to have blend issues and where sacrificing sonority to get the proper shape. The Box told them to make sure they had their horns pointed at the MIC on the Front Sideline and just play within the Section. Then Off Mic a comment was made to the Sound board to increase the volume off of that mic by two clicks. The next rep, the sound was smooth, emotive and what was intended. Even sitting there at the box right next to the caption heads, you could not ever tell that the sound was not just coming from the Mellos' Left Side but also from the Side 1 Speakers if they didn't point that out.
I think many of the issues that arise from the noticeable change from True acoustic to amplified-assisted is the fact that FLO chooses to plant their mics right on the Speakers themselves. And thus the change at the Speaker level is obvious when you're sitting at home watching the Mix that FLO chooses to transmit.
I think if FLO changed their standard MIC positions to being halfway up the stands for all shows, you'll see that the corps balance the speakers for the live paying audience, not the people listening to an unchecked balance broadcast by FLO and their incompetence.
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27 minutes ago, cybersnyder said:
The snag comes that you're assuming that the same number of tickets will be sold to see a 100 member corps as a 154 member corps. OC vs WC attendance seems to point to that not being the case.
People don't go to see OC corps because the quality is not the same a BD. Not because of the size of the corps.
People will pay to see BD whether they have 154 or 100. Same with much of the rest of the top 10. Its coming to the point that most corps are not maximizing the rules with regards to amplification as they could. A properly mic'd hornline of 50 could be just as loud and sound better than a hornline of 80+ without mics.
"Its not the size of the Boat, but the motion of the ocean."
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14 hours ago, JimF-LowBari said:
Well just remember DCI helps to train young musicians... sarcasm off....
Find me a professional musician (brass player) that plays acoustically to large crowds and I'll show you a broke musician.
It's simply a part of the idiom now, Volume and projection have an impact on Sound Equality and the complexity of the material allowed to be solo material.
Imagine Crown Gabriel's Oboe solo/ solis without proper amplification, Only the people crowding the Front sideline would have heard the delicate nature of much of that solo.
Same with the Soloist in Bluecoats show last year, (namely in "Come Together") Had that soloist had to Project to reach the Music judges in the Box he would have had a helluva time trying to get the same quality that he achieved.
Also with Sound Reinforcement, Everyone in the audience could hear the detail, not just the people in the line of fire of the physical bell.
Live quality playing is the name of the game now, There is little that would convince the corps of putting that sand back in the bottle now.
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9 minutes ago, cybersnyder said:
How would decreasing costs increase revenue? It may improve profitability, although I'm not sure what "profit" really means in drum corps. Seems like "profit" simply means "Oh goody, more money to spend next season!"
I'm not a CPA so I'm not sure if I'm using the correct terms but, in my mind;
If you decrease the amount of money you have to spend to earn the same amount of money, the amount of money you take home at the end of the day increases. I guess I should say, decreasing your cost will increase your profit.
If a corps can sell the same amount of tickets using 100 members than it could using 154, why use 154 when you could be more profitable using 100.
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On 1/15/2020 at 7:00 AM, cixelsyd said:
So cost savings matter to you. I have seen that in more than one of your ideas. (We have common ground!)
But to move forward, the DCI collective will need to be convinced that cost matters. Right now, they only seem to care about revenue. Their strategic plan has multiple directives addressing revenue, and a whole task force created just to pursue revenue ideas. But there is no Cost Control Task Force, and there are not even any strategic plan items focused on the cost side of the equation. This will take some time and persuasion.
Yeah I mean we all want to see this activity continue so the sooner the corps realize that reducing cost will also increase their revenue then they will start to see the light.
It does seem though that something pretty dramatic event will have to happen for the corps to begin to consider taking their show indoors. Perhaps Weather and an onslaught of extreme weather will mean that corps simply cant operate in the same manner as temperature outdoors during the summer become unsafe for the performers. Heck even now some shows are being delayed because of the heat index being unsafe for even the people sitting in the stands let alone the performers.
Perhaps in 10 -15 years where DCI might still be holding onto some strict rules and WGI offers them a Blank slate to do with what they wish, some of the designers will pull the activity into the indoor direction. And those that want to remain outdoors and remain true to the idiom as it was originally intended will remain in DCI and ultimately succumb to the natural progression of the activity.
I hope a hostile take over doesn't occur and the activity naturally progresses but as the founders of DCI did so many years ago, when they created DCI, when a group of designers think they are being held down from flourishing and evolving they will find a way. And the better product of the two will survive and thrive, while the latter slowly fades into history.
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So the OC corps are shut out from the Corps directors vote. Only 20 WC are "voting" members. Well that answer some questions to me as to how the majority of the WC corps voted.
And the reasoning Erik gave was just that, the "Throw it on the wall and see if it sticks" approach to this proposal left corps hesitant.
The corps will need some solid evidence and $$ figures in their hands to change this rule.
Thank you for the POD and the insight.
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3 hours ago, garfield said:
Also, another thought: Drum corps producers NEVER rent just the stadium at a venue. They also have to rent facilities for the host school corps and for all the corps in the show. It's most likely that those costs are also included in the school rental costs.
Every year at our show the school was very quick to point out that they could be renting their facilities to others for a lot more than what we were paying. Almost every year we figured we had to clear $15,000 to keep the school from claiming they were giving us an unfair price break.
Also, we have to subtract the amount of other (unkowable) stuff that gets thrown into "show expense" before we draw our assumptions down to actual stadium rental cost. I have all of the P&Ls for the Dublin show for over decade, but those might not be either normal or valid today.
Corps aren't ultimately paying for these expenses on their own? Having the cost deducted from their performance fees? Or a separate line item on their own 990's
That would change things, if the cost for housing each corps is also rolled into this 990 line then the benefits are further diminished.
I always figured the corps fended for themselves with regards to housing. I've always heard of the odd corps that lost their housing site at the last minute and didn't think DCI was organizing and paying for those sites.
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5 hours ago, garfield said:
Everything that came after this opening paragraph needs to be rethought after you calculate in to your analysis the fact that you conflated "Show Expenses" to be the "cost of renting facilities". That's not correct.
The big elephant included in that total of about $6.55mm is the cost of the corps. Memory fades with age but, IIRC, something along the lines of $2.5mm to $3mm of DCI's revenue gets paid out to drum corps as "performance fees" (called all manner of things in the actual DCI record-keeping, I suspect). You can cut costs on stadium facilities (good luck) but, to cut that $3mm paid out to corps, the corps voting membership has to agree to cut their own pay. GOOD LUCK! I'd bet they pound the crap out of that expense statement before they agree to cut their own pay. You'll have those cost no matter where they play. In fact, it's true that the ED's job is to negotiate the very best deal with the stadiums, et al, for the strict benefit of the member corps, not for the benefit (currently) of DCI's income statement. What they save in negotiation is, and should be, paid out the to corps. (This is a whole-other discussion!)
Still, after correcting your numbers down to around $35,000 to rent an "average" stadium, that also makes sense. No, N.E. Brigand, it doesn't cost $35m to rent an average high school stadium but it also costs a whole lot more than $35m to rent your average professional domed football stadium, too. Just do some simple deductive thought using, say $75m to rent Alamo (I truly have no clue) and logically crank that up to, say $125m PER DAY to rent LOS (again, I have NO idea) and you can easily see that four very expensive regional stadiums can lower significantly the average cost per high school stadium. Do HS facilities "cost" $20m to $25m to host drum corps? Yep, you bet. And the big, new fancy Texas stadiums are probably much more.
Now, I very much appreciate your thought process and I'll anticipate following your rationale after you've corrected your thoughts with these corrections.
This issue stumped me and a bunch of others for a day or so in a 990 discussion years ago until I discovered that "paying" the drum corps is an expense on DCI's income statement. Show revenue is income, paying for corps and paying for stadiums (and all the rest) show up as expenses. If you scan all of the expense lines, you'll not find any entry line item that identifies "corps pay" or any such thing on the 990. It's buried in "Show Expense".
The only thing I see in the '18 990 that could be dubious is the ubiquitous "all other expenses" category that collected just under $1mm. OK, that's not huge but it is a little under 10% of their expenses. "Other Expenses" is always for things one deliberately wants to hide or, more likely, "When There's No Place Else To Put Something" -- on the 990 form. That DOESN'T mean that they've not identified those expenses, it's that there's no place on the 990 filing to report them.
You know, like strip clubs, expensive steak houses, and private jets to San Antonio. (I'm KIDDING!!)
I think it's illustrative to look at the numbers in comparison to others. For example, how has that number ("corps pay") changed across 990s?
Your insight to these matters is always on point thank you.
So yeah not the astronomical cost savings that I thought but still on the average still a significant amount of money.
And if you combine that with lowering corps number to 100 and the inherit cost savings to corps there, you can make a sound case that these mega stadiums are what is keeping the activity from seeing better returns and the potential for more corps to be involved.
Now mentioning that the corps are paid out performance fees, I wonder if this is not also a driving force for the corps that have survived the last 20 years to try and keep their numbers low, so that these performance fees stay in their pockets at much higher payouts than say if there were a total of 30-35 WC corps and the payouts would have to be diluted so that all performing corps get their cut.
Having the restrictions of a smaller venue however I do like the idea of an Allentown model at other weekends and major cities across the US. In a city like ATL or Dallas for example that would have the sheer number of people interested to have two shows at the same location in a weekend the lack of travel and floor time would be positives for the corps and fans alike. Those that can afford it can attend both days and get a back to back comparison. Those that can only afford one day can roam the lot one day and watch the shows the next.
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2 minutes ago, N.E. Brigand said:
Well, just doing a quick search, I'm seeing prices to rent a stadium for a football game here in Ohio in the range of $2,000-$4,000.
Whats the Seating capacity? Those shows might be good for local shows in mid week but DCI wants proper performance venues that offer height and concessions and amenities to accommodate a DCI crowd.
That means that the average cost skyrocket once you are renting the College Outdoor Football Stadiums and the NFL Football Stadiums for your Regionals.
Plus at those outdoor shows you always have the chance of being rained out. Indoor Arenas wont have that problem and even at the smaller NHL/ NBA Arenas you could seat 5000 on one side of the stadium and charge a premium over the average HS stadium. Even at an average price of $40 per seat @ 5000 people that's 200,000 in revenue from one event.
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9 minutes ago, leanlion said:
bingo!!!!
The Total Functional Expenses for DCI in 2018 was $12,429,268 The line item identified as Show Expenses is $6,550,694
With so many other line items on Page 10, I would imagine this cost is what the venues asks from DCI to be able to use the stadiums for the shows.
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22 minutes ago, MikeN said:
I know you and I touched base on the other thread on this, but I'd be perfectly fine with it. I'm in love with the corps' performances, not the venue, and you could do virtually every effect already seen outdoors.
My only real experience with indoor drum corps was with Brass Theater II when they passed through the area in '96, but you could see pretty easily how it would go. You *absolutely* would have to cut the number of performers per section, else you'd kill everyone in the stands, but in today's very professional digital tarp-prop-uniform age, you could create some amazing looks and sounds. Could even add more lighting.
Plus, the number of "bad seats" is incredibly diminished, which will make Garfield happy as they could charge much more per spectator. 😝
Mike
There are some serious Masochist out there. If the number spot you want in the Lot is the Inside of a BD or Crown Horn Arc. Imagine that amount of body shaking impact but sitting in the stands.
And this second point is where the next visual frontier is in my mind, Tarps in most cases simply do not work outdoor, but they sure as hell do work indoors. The Costuming and Floor Combination will provide a new dimension of effect that can be used in the marching arts.
And finally Lighting. I've expressed my DCI - Cirque comparisons before and I think what is separating this idiom from other professional performance environments is the use of lighting. I think as long as the Lights are not changed while a piece of Guard equipment in the Air (which can be regulated by rules) then all safety concerns should be quelled.
To mitigate costs, the Lighting rigs and control board can be shared with the corps and the programming can be saved on the corps own programming module.
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21 minutes ago, gak27 said:
1. I have yet to attend an indoors show (DCI, WGI, etc.), and I doubt I will. I know that in some cases, stadiums/arena design has included elements to INCREASE sound focusing/retention with respect to increasing the impact of fan noise. I highly suspect that these elements will NOT benefit sound quality with respect to fans LISTENING to a performance.
2. Short answer? Probably not. Granted, I would probably be intrigued enough to go to a small indoor venue version to see what it's about. TO ME, however, give me outdoors, big, powerful performances, with as much acoustically-based sourcing as you can.
Now I have never been to Indy but I have been to the Old Georgia Dome, Alamodome, and the old RCA Dome and those were obnoxious Echo Chambers.
I'd have to think the the acoustics in a smaller arena would be much improved because the space that the sound waves could echo off each would be greatly diminished. It'll still have some echo but nowhere near as bad as a larger domed Stadium.
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3 minutes ago, cixelsyd said:
I am fairly sure the 990 "Show Expenses" category includes far more than just the cost of stadium rentals.
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/362754480/201902739349300235/full
Page 10 has the Functional Expenses, There are a lot of other categories that you would imagine would be separated from the actual show expenses. For example Judge cost and Travel and other matters are separated into different line items. I would imagine that the Venues tell DCI, WE need X amount of dollars to have the space available and for our Event staff to ensure the arena is protected and used correctly. I assume all of that is included in the Event Expenses.
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This is whats possible on a 90x60 Floor. Most professional Arenas that can house an NHL game have a floor space capable of 200x85 and with modifications 210 x 105.
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Expenses.
Its a big topic on this board and many say that DCI costs are spiraling out of control. So I started to look at what is driving cost up through the roof. I started to look at the DCI's 990 to look at what their actual costs and expenses are. Pulling up their 2018 990 here ( https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/362754480/201902739349300235/full ) you can find that in 2018 DCI spent $6,550,694 on Show Expenses (cost of renting facilities) Looking at their calendar they put on 108 shows in 2018 between WC, OC and Soundsport shows. If you average that out, they Spent $60,654 per show for the DCI tour. That's an insane amount of money for a Non-profit organization to put out to put on these shows.
And that leads me to think what Can DCI do to bring this crazy amount of Cost down? And the one idea that keeps coming through my head is, the football Field. We are married to a football field as our performance venue and this marriage is becoming so expensive it is killing the organization from within. When if you look at most shows, Corps Rarely go outside of the 15 yard lines and rarely spend much time behind the back hash.
Could DCI survive in a smaller venue?
Could DCI perform inside the NBA/ NHL Arenas instead of a football field?
Looking at the Size of NHL Rink. The regulation size is 200 x 85, But most NBA/NHL Size arenas can easily move the back and side bleachers and easily reach a common space of 210 x 105 Feet. Or what you would know as 15 to 15 and Front Sideline to Back Hash.
Now you might ask what does an average Arena Cost to rent for a day? http://rockandrollguru.blogspot.com/2011/03/price-of-concert-breaking-down-where.html
$20,000 a Night.
If in 2018 DCI rented arenas instead of Football Stadiums the expenses for Show Expenses would shrink to: $2,160,000, a reduction of $4,390,694. Even if you inflate the $20,000 Cost by 50% $30,000 to cover for Security, event staff, Logistics etc.., You would have expenses at $3,240,000. A Reduction of $3,310,694.00.
For comparison, Looking at WGI's 990; (https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/311421760/201813129349300016/full) WGI spent $1,635,975 in 2018 on Event Expenses. They put on 77 events some are duplicated so you can 70 events in 2018 ( For comparison WGI is putting on 64 events in 2020) Their average expense was $23,371.07 per event.
If you're thinking, Well they cant get as many people in an arena as they can in a Football stadium, you'd be right, If you where to sell one side of the arena as you did in a football stadium most arenas have a capacity of 12,202 for 180° shows https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Arena Some are larger, Some are smaller.
While the smaller shows are hosted in High School stadiums. The largest HS Stadiums in the country https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-largest-high-school-stadiums-in-the-us.html have a seating capacity of 20,000+ but you can only sell one side. But DCI is not in these large stadiums often so you could argue that most of the early season shows happen in locations where the seating capacity is around 5,000 people.
So while the maximum number of people that could attend an event would be reduced to about 12,000 the average capacity will be increased to somewhere around 10,000 people for event. There is also the possibility for cities that normally have larger stadiums to have 2 shows one Saturday and Sunday to make sure that everyone wants to see the shows get to see the shows. Reducing Fuel cost and increasing member health as they get to get some serious floor time by going back to the same school. Funny enough that these large Regional NFL Stadiums are the ones that could be pointed too as having the largest impact on these expenses. They also offer performance audiences close to 20,000 people.
So the average attendance size goes up. Meanwhile DCI because of the stacked nature of Arenas has more space on the 50, And can increase the amount of "VIP" or high cost tickets. Most of these arenas also have Suites, You can sell suites and club level tickets for a premium something that simply doesnt exist in the average Football Stadium.
The next positive, NO WEATHER! No Rain Delays, No 98 Degree heat in Texas after Sundown. 65 Degrees A/C with a cold Beer in hand and with the corps so close you can reach out and touch them.
And then the last component. For the individual Corps. While you can with ease field 154 members on a field of this size, you might start to feel cramped. For the corps it might improve the aesthetic to reduce the size for the corps to 100 members. You remove one Bus you remove 54 mouths to feed, and on down and continue the corps budget will shrink. You will still pay the same amount of money to see Blue Devils regardless if they have 154 members or if they have 100 members.
With the Cost going down, More corps have an opportunity to compete and because of decreased member size more talent is distributed to other corps, and the overall talent goes up.
So I ask knowing all of this,
Is the Football Field and being outdoors essential to your enjoyment of Drum corps? If losing the Football Field meant that the activity not only survives but flourishes would you willingly waive goodbye to the Football Field?
In my mind I already have.
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1 minute ago, Jeff Ream said:
yet Bluecoats folded their guard. Cavies did eons ago.
Similar to SCV Guard you would imagine that they will come out again. Same with Pride of Cincinnati, Most IW guards go in and out of competition for various reasons, I think Boston's new Guard Inspire took a lot of the potential members from Bluecoats. Also with Stanbury's recent announcement, Greg Logola is now a costuming partner of Inspire and the Boston Crusaders so that may have had some impact on their situation.
Chromium Winds IOW has some affiliation with Cavaliers as recent as last year IIRC.
FLO questions
in DCI World Class Corps Discussions
Posted
I'm giving Flo the benefit of the Doubt. The fact that they acknowledge and hired the people who know how to fix the problem they had makes me optimistic that the sound will be better.
I am most curious to see where they place the mics. I am hoping they move the mics back from the field and have at least one of the mics close to the Box. These sound designers are doing everything to mix the sound for LIVE performances and ultimate clarity at the box. That would take the guess work out of mixing the Field mics and the Direct amplified sounds ( front ensemble, solo, and voiceovers) and just make the live audio what we hear at home.
1080P is a plus.
The one thing I didnt hear is increased Server/ Bandwidth capacity. Leaving Finals night a toss up if the quality of the stream will be there but it is what it is.
Here's to the Return of DRUM CORPS!!