1956OPR

dcfever, I'm not sure what you mean by "open up the guard" but the 2016 audition info says guard auditions will be for female performers only. My sense of the Regiment's view of all-female vs. a combined female/male guard is that it has everything to do with the specific program. For example, I can't imagine "Faust" or "Spartacus 08" without males in the guard. I also can't imagine "City of Light" as requiring a male guard component (other than, perhaps, to carry the shopping bags). If I have misunderstood your meaning, let us know. As a side note, Spartacus will live forever!

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x, I know this must have been a typo but next year is our 60th anniversary, a diamond anniversary ( one of a number of diamond-designated anniversaries ). You are certainly correct about the original name, chosen by Alex Haddad, our founder. Rockford was then known, at least in Illinois, as the Forest City…until a Dutch Elm Disease ravaged the city. I've been thinking about 2016. The furthest I've gotten is to select a program title, i.e., "The Regiment. A Classical Tradition" As for music, I would like to have the corps select a classical piece from each of our 6 decades and build a show with these. For those that might question whether there is anything classical from our first decade, I would mention Un Bel Di ( which we knew then as One Fine Day) and Pagliacci. My recollection is that both pieces were introduced to PR by Ms Marian Armato, a classical pianist who assisted our horn line during our early years and who later. as I recall, moved to Denver and had some association with the Blue Knights. I always think of her when the conversation turns to the Regiment's classical tradition. Marian was the spark. Anyway, I can hear the clamor already among those who admonish us about retrieving songs we've featured in the past (and I do not necessarily disagree with the sentiment) but I do believe that among the many arrangements scored by Jim Wren, Michael Klesch and JD Shaw we could find six that would meet the test. If our DCPlaneteers have any suggestions, let us know. Thanks.

My thesis is that, for purposes of calculating DCI's caption awards, any penalty assessed against a corps should be assessed against the caption total associated with the penalty. In 2015, the Blue Devils were assessed ( according to certain posters on DCP's Blue Devils 2015 "Ink" site - see pages 80-1, posts 793, 794 and 804) a 0.50 penalty for using a Dr. Beat (a loud metronome) during a Prelims warmup. On the Prelims Recap, the 0.50 penalty is noted in the Penalties column as an offset to the Blue Devils' Sub-Total of 95.850, a seemingly benign "what was that for?" impact. My argument is that, for purposes of determining Caption Award winners, the 0.50 penalty should be specifically assessed against the Blue Devils' Music Percussion score. Since there were 2 percussion judges, just take 0.50 off of the original averaged percussion score of 19.30, thus resulting in a revised Music Percussion score of 18.80 in Prelims. Utilizing this 18.80 in the averaging formula used by DCI to determine Caption award results, the top 5 percussion ensembles of DCI in 2015 were 1. The Cadets 19.45, 2. Bluecoats 19.35, 3. SCV 19.33, 4. Blue Devils 19.32 and 5. Carolina Crown 18.85 Hail The Cadets!

A reconstruction of the 2015 DCI World Class Championship's 3 days of competition results in Carolina Crown winning the Founder's Trophy. I have 2 theses in support of Crown's victory. The first is that the Founder's Trophy should be awarded to the corps with the highest average score as a result of averaging their respective scores from all 3 days of competition. This is the fair basis for the awarding the Angelica, Brazale, Ott, Sanford and Zingali caption winners and, arguably, should be the basis for the Founder's Trophy as well. If applied, the top 5 average scores would be 1. 96.775 Carolina Crown, 2. 96.542 Blue Devils, 3. 95.975 Bluecoats, 4. 95.625 The Cadets and 5. 93.525 SCV. Parenthetically, if Los Diablos had not incurred the 0.50 penalty in the Prelims, the reconstructed order be the same but BD's average would be 96.708. The second thesis is that the Ordinal for each corps' placement during each of the 3 days of competition should be a confirming factor in determining the champion, with the lowest aggregated ordinal winning the championship. If applied, the top 5 would be First : Carolina Crown (4), Second : Blue Devils (7), Third : Bluecoats (9), Fourth : The Cadets (10) and Fifth : SCV (15). Also, common sense should dictate that a corps such as Carolina Crown, which finished first, first and second, respectively, in Prelims, Semis and Finals should be accorded the edge over a corps, the Blue Devils, which finished fourth, second and first ( or if the 0.50 penalty is ignored, second, second and first ). Hail Crown! Now, onto A Modest Proposal, Part 2 : The Cadets Win the Fred Sanford Best Percussion Award in 2015.

Mr. Hopkins, et al. If you do choose to change this year's uniform for effect, how about a cream cadet-style jacket, black pants with no stripe and a maroon cummerbund? Whatever the corps wears, for me they will always be The Cadets. A Fan.

I am not bleeding but thanks for your concern. Perhaps we can then expect a 99.850 at finals. If so, it will be another tribute to the talented MMs. It is great that the Diablos have such loyal passionate fans.

I am a bit crotchety tonight because I can't figure out how to insert Maneuvah's excellent post # 62 into this space ahead of Mello Dude's post below and for the reasons stated in my critique. Both posts are fair summaries of my current opinion re Fake Plastic GE. I have grown to despise the past, current and developing trends in "smoke and mirrors" show design which have heightened body distortion, props, park & bark staging, and the sexploitation of guard members as means to distinguish a particular corps concept. Drum corps is supposed to be a youth education project, not an exercise in fraud. What has sent me over the edge this year is a certain portion of the Devil's 2015 program, i.e., the K-pop segment. As I understand it, K-pop references Korean pop, the niche musical genre that originally featured Psy, his singularly stupid body distortions and repetitive mindless music. Now we have 2 minutes or so of some synthesized K-pop accompanied by a lot of Devils rolling around on the grass. What a great way of using 20% of your show doing NOTHING. What a concept! To me, it is nothing more than krap-pop and the Devils should be ashamed of introducing this music and motion to the field. A lot has been said in this discussion about the repetitive use of these GE and Visual tools as corps attempt to discern how and why to emulate the Devil's success. Well, first a corps has to match the excellence of their MM's technical talents in the musical sections. Then, most importantly, we need a judging community that doesn't continually embarrass itself by continuously rewarding the "smoke and mirrors" approach to show design. Instead of rewarding a corps for 2 minutes or so of krap. they should discount their score 20%. And then, maybe, we will see an end to this foolishness. Good night.

Attended the show last night. Great crowd; stadium near capacity. Stellar performance from SCV. The team of the Rennicks and JD are lining up Vanguard for a long competitive run. A tough trio for Phantom to replace but percussion now seems to be settled with Bret, Jesse and Rob. I wish I could dispel my concerns with the brass arranger side of the equation insofar as the apparent difficulty we have had in matching the past projective power of the arrangements of Wren, Klesch and Shaw. I am pleased that our Visual competitiveness has taken a turn for the better. On a lighter note, the lightening which occurred to the north during their show certainly heightened Vanguard's Spark. Perhaps analogous to Mr. Hopkins' fire station gambit a few year's back. The Regiment continues to improve. I attended their rehearsal earlier in the day and I am confident that they will continue to sort out the program difficulties that have obsessed a few posters. The Academy has a delightful show. Agree with the relative scores and spreads. Golden Empire was very impressive for a second year corps. Congratulations to their staff and MM. More competitive California corps are just a matter time. The only bump in the road last night was that during PR's performance, another corps' brass warm-up routine noticeably intruded from afar.

Jason, Thank you for adding the rehearsal information. Other event sponsors should do this. What time will the Will Call window open?

According to the Viewer Profile, his/her favorite drum corps show was the Regiment's 2010 Into the Light production so this person is into their 5th year of a Regiment Satisfaction Withdrawal Syndrome. Maybe it was the Queen Puppet that sent him over the edge. There isn't any cure except watching Phantom Regiment with a loving heart.

The latest judging sheets to which I have access are listed on issuu.com and have a 2012 publication date. The General Effect sheets for a World Class corps distinguish between 1. GE Visual and 2. GE Musical. For me, that suggests that a Recap sheet which, as was the case in Clovis, lists GE1 and GE2 is stating that GE 1 is GE Visual and GE 2 is GE Music. The explanations on both sheets as to the application of the judging standards are almost identical and may fairly require a Jesuit or a Rabbi to distinguish between Visual and Music. I have always simply distinguished the two by asking what I see and what I hear and if I were asked to judge Visual I would look at what the corps is doing and let the Music judge concern herself with what she is hearing. Somewhere along the road, the decision has been made Ad Majorem Corps Glorium that GE Visual has to incorporate Music and vice versa. Perhaps it is just part of DCI's cross-training of judges? The other source I used for my comment was frontensemble.com. It is great site and one, drummergirl, you may find of great value. It includes a list of all judges, which shows each has judged and in what capacity. In the case of MC, in Indy it was GE Visual and in Clovis it was GE Music. xandandl, thank you for your insights. I wonder what Mr. Kennedy would have to say about our discussion and whether he enjoyed judging Visual as much as he has enjoyed judging Music. As fan of the activity and in respect to their backgrounds, I would prefer that MC stick to Visual and JK be constrained to Music.

As part of your analysis, keep in mind that MC judged GE Visual in Indy and GE Music in Clovis.

Thank you Blue Stars for honoring my fellow Regiment MM with Amazing Grace. Grace is one of the characteristics Dave had in amazing abundance.

Garfield, please add me to what must be a long list of those who are very grateful to you for your exposition. Thank you! I do have question. When I watch videos of battery practices, there seems to be quite a bit of vocalizations from one or more of the snares, a lot of emphatic " dot, dot, dots ". Is this instructional advice re timing or tempo or,,,? And, is this done on the field by the battery during competition? And, does this technique lend itself to use by other sections of the corps? Thank you.

I believe that is Cody Newell, Blue Devils guard 2104 and Color Guard tech for the Regiment in 2015. The combination of Cody in his 2014 BD guard gear and the Eiffel tower is a nice tribute from the Regiment's color guard for his efforts this spring in Rockford.

Re the Regiment's program: How about updating the program title to City of Light and eliminating Poulenc's piano concerto from the repertoire? Thank you.

The current program information listed on the Regiment's site no longer lists Poulenc's Piano Concerto piece as part of their 2015 Paris show. Don't know why but perhaps eliminating this music will allow Phantom to use more of the Gershwin and/or Debussy and/or Saint-Saens music, which is certainly OK with me.

Jim Wren, brass instructor and arranger for Phantom Regiment, 1968-1999. Dr. Dan Richardson, program advisor and coordinator for Phantom Regiment, 1972-present. John Brazale, instructor and designer for Phantom Regiment, 1975-1992. Bret Kuhn, battery instructor and arranger for The Cavaliers and Phantom Regiment.

Rest in Peace, Dave. It was an honor to step off the line with you, Jim, Dr. Dan and the rest of our formative Phantom Regiment ensemble. SUTA! Michael

I, for one, am getting very tired of arguments ad hominem about whether someone has marched D&BC as a guideline for whether their opinions deserve a hearing or not. I'm sure that there are a number of posters here on DCP who never stepped on the competitive field with a corps but who, nonetheless, have some relationship ( such as a volunteer or mom or tour manager or…?) with DC and who live and breath drum corps as a musical performance art and/or love drum corps because a particular corps has touched their heart and soul. Their opinions deserve credit in this community. I am 72 and marched 1956-1960 with the Regiment when it was born and was in its infancy and the fact that it became a respected world class corps does not entitle my opinion to any more weight on this forum than someone who is 19 and has not marched. Listen to what our posters say and, if you do not agree, tell us why without attacking the character or experience or…? of the contributor. This forum should not be a game of "gotcha". Now, as others have said, back to Regiment "15 and (I hope) the Summer of City of Light (kdaddy's suggestion on Dec 5: Occam's Razor reigns again).

We now have a picture on PR's FB page of the snare auditions. Seems to be about 30 or so pounding away. So, any thoughts on the 2015 battery? How many returning from 2014? Strengths and weaknesses? Needs? Suggestions? Someone here has mentioned the impact of Matt Jordan's leaving may have on the return of some 2014 FE members. Is it too soon to say? Is it fair to say that it takes 3-4 years for the percussion chief to build a potential Sanford challenger? I thing BK has done it before and I trust him to do it again with the Regiment.

Well, my friend, you are a risk taker.