lcarlton

Very sad to see but understandable.

I'm on the other side of this.. having done the small pay to pay thing, it's nice but it still leaves the mid level 20-30 person ensembles without a means to grow, and/or foster the development of new field groups. I'm discussing a bridge to entertainment and growth if that makes sense.

It was brought up again at the meeting this year. About creating 3 classes, including a class for groups between 20-30/35 to compete and still field a corps but it didn't get enough votes to pass. There were a lot of groups that were sitting at 25-30 consistently and were doing a mix of SDCA, and Soundsport that ceased operations eventually like Horizon, Rocketeers, Appalachian Sound, Thunder Brigade, Mon Valley Express, Indianapolis Ignition, and a many more. Some of them may have filled a competitive opportunity that allows them to get a full score while competing at a capable level.

I don't trash DCP or any of the drum corps groups. I feel they are valuable tools to gain insight into potential fans, supporters, and help grow a network of support for the corps. This news is troubling and does give me some pause and I hope it's just this year. There are challenges with recruiting at times, especially with schools starting earlier and even marching band competitions starting. In Ohio, we have State Music competitions that now start labor day weekend which presents a barrier for membership for a lot of potential young, or even adult members. If you're an adult with kids; your kids are now in school so you can't leave for a few days to do DCA. If you're an HS student in a competition band you may have a competition and your director won't let you leave for DCA so you can't march. If you're a college student in a college band, it's less likely you'll be able to miss your first or second game for DCA; if you are in the OSU Band, you can't miss ANY games which cuts out students from the largest university.

Columbus Saints - 2019 Show Announcement Announcing our 2019 Drum & Bugle Corps production - "Heart of Steam"! Featuring the music of Bear McCreary ; Emmy award winning composer for Agents of Shield, Battlestar Galactica, The Walking Dead, and Godzilla: King Of The Monsters; Panic at the Disco ; Platinum rock artists Alice's Night Circus ; UK Steampunk artist Inspired by Matt King's "World of Steam" series, the 2019 Saints will enter a world or Steam powered dreams as we tell a unique story of love, and perseverance! Learn more: http://www.columbussaints.org/our-prog…/2019-heart-of-steam/

This is exciting!

They no longer do the spring meeting; instead it's a conference call which announces show draw.

The corps made the choice to cancel due to 90% thunderstorm forecast and conversations with other corps directors and DCA leadership. The show was financed by a grant by the United Way, and the host school offered a deep discount so it was going to be a low-cost show. Sprinkled during the day, the opened up at 6PM till about 8PM with heavy rain, thunderstorms, and lightning. They actually went and had a free indoor event with two corps who came and performed at the Saints facility.

I made this as visual representation of DCA corps as I saw a map like this for World or Open for DCI. Download and share if you like.

I made a list of DCA Corps Open Houses and dates to aid in people finding more details. Please update with details once you have them and I'll edit the main post. I don't really know how to import a table so I'm just going with a bullet list. Here is the GOOGLE DRIVE SHEET : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bAqyTfrAe98lMS24xke_C1Bt4l7iKm16cZqdJd60H2k/edit?usp=sharing . DATES ARE IN BOLD | FOLLOW THE LINK FOR DETAILS I removed the bullet list below because it was too much to update. I've updated the list and added info from five more corps. I'll create some graphics and maybe a short video too.

I'd be interested in digitizing them and cleaning up some of the worst ones. Do you have the negatives by chance as well? My long-term goal would be to create a project and get an intern to help in preserving these, then potentially send them to DCX to add to those corps records.

Absolutely amazing analysis. Thanks so much! So many great corps and shows from this period!

Appalachian Sound and Storm folded. Armada switched to WGI Winds. Rivermen, Hub City, and Lone Star postponed recruiting and premiering until the 2019 season. Florida Xpress just came back from being inactive for a season. Not sure their plans. Based on the comments by the Encorps director; it'd be reasonable to see them apply for OC in 2019 or 2020 season.

It opened up hard with thunder and lightning around 6PM and didn't stop till 730. It rained till about 830PM in Pataskala that weekend so either way, it would have been rained out or rain delayed. It sucks because we were hoping for those funds and the score but we, and the rest of the directors agreed it was the right decision.