Bobby L. Collins

I take it you've never been to Philadelphia. Or Los Angeles. Or Pittsburgh. Or Houston. Or Cincinnati. You're not dealing with band parent volunteers at pro venues. You're dealing with the guy who took a swing at Tim Snyder x 20.

Competition is fine, so long as it is balanced with education. Today, education has been tossed out the window in favor of what cannot even be described as competition, but rather as an arms race to see who can blow the biggest budgets and do the most ludicrous crap on the field.

.....it happens practically all the time. Especially when alcohol is involved. Hence, nearly ever pro sporting venue has a blitzed fan who thinks he or she can sit anywhere they please, and when they try to pick a fight with ticket holders, an usher, or a security guard......they pay the iron price.

No it isn't. It's you immediately not discussing the issues and trying to make it personal....AGAIN. Getting pretty pathetic, stu. I don't have access to the directors of corps today. Certainly nowhere near the access you claim to have. I'm not on an intimate first-name basis like you seem to be boasting you are. If that's so, then why don't you get on the Batphone and summon some of them here now? I would value their input in this discussion greatly. Otherwise, my feedback has just as much chance to get to them through this message board as it does for me to call each director individually and get the runaround from their admins for the next 18 months. Now, are we done, stu? By all means, go ahead and get in your last word, because I get the tangible sense that's really important to you....far more important than a rational discussion. I have made a solid effort to present my argument here against the use of amplification, dancing and leotards..........what exactly have you done, other than try to troll me?

I am not insulting the corps, I am criticizing the product. A performance group is not immune to criticism, and if they take it as an insult, that's on them. Now you can certainly call my criticisms gratuitous if you want to. That's fine with me. But there are gratuitous things happening in the activity today, and the only way to describe and discuss them is with gratuity in kind. I don't have time to be nice, or to wear kid gloves. I'm not trying to catch flies with honey here, I'm trying to swat flies with candid honesty. I don't give a toss if small-minded sycophants on the internet like it or not (and that's not directed at you, Fran. They know who they are....and if they don't like it, they need to stop acting the part).

Sadly you're probably right about that. WJ Julian tried to establish a regional in Neyland years ago, and Doug Dickey, the athletic director, was totally on board. DCI said no. The parking situation on UTK campus hasn't really improved since then, and I doubt athletics would even dream of letting that many feet touch the field today. On the other hand, Neyland already has a built-in dialed-to-11 amplification system for its 300 member marching band, so that would save corps tens of thousands of dollars in batteries alone.

But that's the point. DCI's target market wasn't limited to bandos then. You still had corps directors recruiting from YMCAs and Boys/Girls Clubs, not out of necessity, but out of desire to reach kids that otherwise wouldn't have had the opportunity. Today, if you're not an all state player in a wealthy feeder school, you've got two strikes against you for even stepping foot in the activity. Drum corps doesn't have to be limited to band kids, especially if 90% of drum corps is going to continue to be dancing with their instruments laying on the ground.

Looks nice, but if they won't let Neyland Stadium host a show, I don't know how you'd talk them into this.

I will tell any director exactly what I think of the direction they're leading their corps, yes, even to their face, should the opportunity arise. That's how passionate I am about this activity, and how strong my convictions are. And I would certainly welcome that opportunity. But that's between me and them.....not between me and a gang of trolls on a message board who can't think of any better way to contribute to the discourse than to speculate on my character and resolve. This discussion isn't about me, it's about what's wrong in the drum corps activity. I suggest you try to stay on topic.

Honestly, my vote is for SCV Alumni. That was the only production I enjoyed on any level whatsoever. I also enjoyed hearing USMC drowning out the first half of recaps.

Please do. Tell me WHY these were shows for the ages. Explain to me what moments in these shows will be shown on a jumbotron hype video in years to come. Which tunes will be played? Which drill maneuvers will be showcased? Here's what I think they'll show. They'll show baritones and mellophones pretending to be the abstract interpretation of insects while the trumpets stand still off-camera. They'll show A giant wave prop for 12 seconds and then cut to soloists filtered through a vocoder. They'll show a bunch of guys running around the field dressed in feathers and acting out a scene from Lord of The Flies. They'll show a half naked kid running around with a wooden cross while 140 other kids play tag with him They'll show tight closeups of front ensembles acting like they just took a hit of ecstacy while they grin like a bunch of harlequins playing amplified marimba chords with soft yarn mallets. And they'll probably showcase a singer whose microphone doesn't work. And you know what? I doubt they'll play ANY of the music. I bet real world dollars all you'll hear is an Adele song beneath a bunch of dancing, emoting, and hanging on the sides of props. Because THAT is what drum corps is all about today.

To discuss issues and concerns about the activity with other passionate fans. Is that answer satisfactory?

Free or not....it's public. The PUBLIC has access to it. An audience that would otherwise have never even bothered with drum corps had the opportunity to watch it, and to make the decision whether or not to support it. The chance moment of someone changing the channel may very well have altered the course of someone's life, as a young child (such as myself) was exposed for the very first time to an activity that he or she otherwise would have never even heard about. That's gone. Now, the only way the public is going to ever even hear about drum corps is to already belong to a Facebook group or Subreddit devoted to some form of marching arts, in which DCI is promoted...or else already be in band or have a child in band (which is an ever-shrinking pool of resources, as music programs are being cut across the country). The public isn't going to chance upon an overpriced subscription package for an unreliable streaming service that not even the fans of the activity like, nor are they going to chance upon parking lot warmups or bootleg performances on YouTube. PBS was the best shot to reach the largest number of people, to extend outside the bubble of the activity and reach out to a wider audience. That bubble is now sealed airtight, and as I said before, if that doesn't change, then those inside the bubble are going to suffocate.

Sadly, that's ME today.

I see that a lot on here. Revisionist history trying to paint a picture in which DCI was horrible in the 70s, 80s and 90s, and always nearing the verge of total collapse, saved from the depths of oblivion only by adding amps and trombones. Also trying to act like Chuck Mangione wasn't a big act in the late 70s. Everyone played his music because it was good music, end of story. Some of the most iconic shows from DCI's history comes from those years. I challenge anyone to find something from 2017 that's going to be considered "iconic drum corps" in 40 years. Besides the leotards, of course.

If it's really that important to you, then sure. Now, do you feel like you've won something? Because that's totally not what this is about.

And if so, then fine. When my time comes, I'll die with the satisfaction of knowing I stood up for what I believe in, despite your best efforts to tell me that there's no point. And if that amuses corps directors, then so be it.

Seriously though, who WERE the darlings this year? Boston?

And as I said, my message is squarely for them, not you. Hopefully, some of them will see it. Whether they take it to heart or not is on them, not me.

You'd like that, wouldn't you? The second an ideology threatens yours, your sensibility is "Love it or leave it". No need to discuss it, just attack! How about I love it, despite the efforts of DCI, along with individuals like you, to drive me away, and do all I can to help steer the activiity away from the disaster it is heading for? 2017 IS the year in which DCI hornlines and drumlines started wearing leotards. That is a verifiable fact, and you cannot argue with that. All you can do is pedantically try to debate the semantics behind the costume materials and nomenclature.....at the end of the day, it's a skintight leotard. And that WILL be remembered in the history of the activity. It's not a question of credibility (which seems to be YOUR one note..."lol u lose all credibility when u say something I don't like".....), it's a question of attacking rather than debating. And if all you want to do is attack, flame and insult one's credibility.....you can do that to someone else, because just like Guardling, I'm not having it. You're not adding anything to the discussion. Love it or leave it.

It's just that's all you ever type. It accounts for well over a quarter of your total posts on this forum. "It was exactly the same X number of decades ago". No, it wasn't. If it were, then this discussion wouldn't be happening every single day among fans. Now you may sit there and say "Well all you ever say on here is that drum corps sucks today", and true as that may be, I'm bringing as many thoughts and ideas to the table I can think of to the discourse, in the hopes of rational discussion (which is genuinely rare inside this echo chamber). Your contribution.....your ONLY contribution.....to the discourse is "Pfft, it was exactly the same back in my day". And it wasn't. Audience members weren't sticking their fingers in their ears "back in the day" because the amps were too hot like they're doing today, they were instead cupping their hands behind their ears so they could absorb as much of the bugle sound as they possibly could. Now I could keep going with examples, but I have a feeling you're not too interested unless I give you an opportunity to type "Yeah yeah people have been saying that since the 70s", and I'm not having it. No one in the 70s was saying "Which corps is that? I can't tell because they're all wearing ballerina costumes".

THERE IT IS. Been wondering when you were going to post that.

It's not "my" vision. It's the framework that DCI had already initiated, before it abandoned reason for madness. But at the end of the day, my comments aren't really for you. They're for the corps directors and techs who read the comments on this site. Let them read mine, and let them read yours. Let THEM decide if they should listen to former supporters who have become disenfranchised with the direction of the activity, or listen instead to enablers who blindly praise everything they do without question, and whose mantra is "leave the past in the past". You say "If you want to change things, do something about it". I AM doing something about it. At least I'm trying. All you're doing is saying that I shouldn't even bother to try. I don't expect drum corps to go back to 2 valve bugles and high step marching. But the sweeping changes that are transforming the activity from drum corps into summer guard and marching band MUST be reigned in, they MUST be scrutinized, and they MUST be re-evaluated. By and large, 2017 shaped up to be a fairly forgettable season, whose recap sound byte on the DVD box set will be "This was the year of leotards, faulty electronics, and even bigger props". The corps can not keep relying on total sensory overload just to win a medal. At some point, things MUST go back to a sensible balance between "innovation" and "expense", or else even the founders are going to fold.

Who are we to pigeonhole them into embracing all the sweeping changes they may or may not have asked for any more than we did? They don't have a choice. They either put on a spandex leotard and dance while playing into microphones, or they don't participate in the activity. There ARE young people out there who would rather spin rifles and sabres and twirl flags instead of sashaying around the field waving jazz hands. There ARE young people out there who would rather march intricate and well-polished drill instead of rolling around on the ground and dancing from one scatter drill to the next. And there ARE young people out there who would rather just throw down with some banging tunes instead of constantly exploring the transcendental boundaries of electronic sound like a bunch of avant-garde musicologists from the 1960s. Those young people are for all purposes bared from the activity, unless they agree to abandon their convictions and personal integrity in order to fit in with the "cool kids". Not every single high school marching band out there has adapted BOA's "Flash-Over-Substance" philosophy......not yet. THOSE kids no longer have an activity like DCI, because what goes on in DCI isn't cool, or relevant, or even respectable to them. Not only is DCI limiting accessibility to its audience of fans and vets, but it is also limiting accessibility to the very individuals it claims to represent and work for; Youth.

I don't think some of you have been to as many sporting events as you like to claim. You pull that kind of crap at a pro game, and not only are you being removed from your seat, you're going to the parking lot, either feet-first or head-first. The only "snowflakes" in the equation are the ones that think an empty seat is fair game. Sit where your ticket tells you to sit, and stop being part of the problem.