Bobby L. Collins

and it also made our corps look more.......uniform......in appearance. All it is today is play-acting and trying to get the most face time on camera. The opposite of uniformity.

The corps that scales back on.......EVERYTHING, will be the fan favorites. And probably won't even make semis as a result.

Agree 100%. But "try harder" doesn't have to mean "Do everything by the numbers the way last year's gold medalist did, and take it over the top". That's how we've gotten to where we are with amplification, props, costumes and dancing. I'd rather see some creative and imaginative thinking next year, thinking that doesn't focus so much on "How can we top BD?", but instead on "How can we top ourselves?".

Yeah it's really hard to claim the activity is growing when the number of active corps has shrunk from over 200 to less than 4 dozen. And why did all those corps disappear? It certainly wasn't because every single corps director in the US and Canada couldn't manage money. No, it was because DCI abandoned its mission to provide a platform for all those corps to thrive, and instead focused upon cutthroat competition. That's all anyone here really cares about anymore.....who wins finals. Well as far as I'm concerned, NO ONE won Saturday night. Culturally, ideologically, and ethically, we have all lost. Today, the battle for decimal points on a sheet of paper sells tickets, rather than any sort of pretense of a wide variety in musical and visual styles between all the different corps. And I think that's a real shame. Corps could operate on a FRACTION of their budgets today if they would stop spending all their money on such needless equipment and gimmicks to score G.E. Ticket sales and attendance may be up at shows, but the bottom line is that DCI is now performing to a fraction of the audience they once bolstered. Because you know whose watching all those clips on YouTube? Band kids and vets. The same people who are still going to shows. The activity is simply no longer relevant outside the insular bubble maintained by those who grew up participating in it or who are currently participating. And that trend is unsustainable in the long term.

Terri, I am not a troll. Read my other posts. I'm bringing thoughts and ideas to the table. I can't help it if I think their costumes look embarrassing. You think I'm the only one that thinks that? No one else on this site pulls their punches, why should I? Because it's the Cadets? Are we not allowed to mention the Cadets in this Cadets thread? Or are we only allowed to praise? Is criticism off the table? Or is only criticism you agree with allowed? As I said, if a drum corps fan who hadn't followed this season looked at that photo, they wouldn't even know that was the Cadets, or that is even a drum corps. As I said, I wasn't trying to be funny, and I'm certainly not trolling. I'm simply pointing out that today, there is nothing about the corps that visually identifies it as the Holy Name Garfield Cadets of Bergen County. AND that it looks like everyone on the field is in the color guard. Try not to get so upset because I'm offering some commentary from a different point of view. And just because that point of view does not align with your own....that doesn't mean I'm trolling.

Having posted that, I just realized that I probably described every single state in the union.

The problem is that music education is very, very, very low on the list of priorities in the state of Tennessee, and band programs are getting cut left and right in order to fund athletics. Business leaders and sponsors don't really discern the difference between band and drum corps (although, come to think of it, neither do I anymore), because neither is really a part of the culture here the way it is in the midwest. Today, outside of actual band students and their families, hardly anyone in Tennessee even knows drum corps exists, despite the state fielding at least 5 corps since the 60s. And most band directors here are still hostile towards drum corps, even at the college level (primarily because the tour interferes with band camps). There's also the problem of Tennessee's business leaders practicing the "Good Ole Boy" system; "I'll scratch your back if you're related to me, or if we're friends, or if you know someone who already scratches my back". Other than a tax break, they just don't feel like there's a lot that a non-profit marching band can offer them to make it worth their while. That said, all credit to Music City for overcoming a ton of obstacles and doing what practically everyone in Tennessee said was impossible for 30 years.

If it's any of your ###### business, my family wouldn't have been able to afford to watch it if it had cost anything. You honestly think people would have subscribed to a premium satellite feed to watch drum corps in the 70s, 80s and 90s? Believe it or not, not everyone in drum corps back then was born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Kind of like the thousands of families today who have a kid who would give an arm and a leg to march, but can't afford $4,000.00 a summer. I saved up for 6 years to pay for my tour fee, which was only a quarter of that. If the broadcast had NOT been free, then I, along with thousands upon thousands of other fans and members, would have never even been exposed to the activity. In a time where the majority of band directors in North America were openly hostile towards drum corps, those FREE broadcasts were the absolute best recruiting tool available to DCI. Now, it's all gated behind a paywall, or otherwise limited to social media and pirated clips on YouTube. So don't you sit there and try to judge me because I lament the fact that the average american has to sign up for an unreliable and poorly-engineered premium service in order to even be exposed to drum corps today. That kind of elitist attitude right there is why the activity has become so inaccessible to everyone that isn't living vicariously through their kids in band or has been a fan for 30 to 40 years (a demographic that is shrinking every single day). If DCI has to nickel and dime the fans and, more importantly, its members just to operate, then maybe it needs to cut its operating costs. And I can supply a pretty comprehensive list of where they can start.....

Yeah I generally stop reading after that word. Normally tends to be a waste.

Oh sure, it definitely made a few. That is without question. But it lost a lot more. You may not see it or feel it yet. But you will.

Nothing really within the past few years. I agree 100% there are still tasty licks and impressive moves in drum corps today, but those instances are either spread out between minutes (and I do mean MINUTES) of minimalist twaddle, or else buried beneath a bunch of special effects and jazz hands. As I said the other day, it's getting to the point where it's simply easier to NOT watch a show on YouTube or elsewhere than it is to sit and fast forward trying to find something that's tolerable to the eyes and ears. If pressed, really hard, I would have to go back to 2011 to find a show I can even stand to watch from beginning to end. And even then, there are large portions of the show I would simply rather not watch or hear. Examples? Bluecoats, Phantom, and Madison. Creep is a spectacular opener, but I'd rather stick a pistol in my mouth than be forced to sit through the first minute of that that show; it's just a bunch of scatter drill and interpretive dance to someone holding down 5 notes on a synthesizer, and it reads more like a high school band that didn't have time to chart an on-field entrance. Awesome brass sound, but marred in every conceivable way by the synthesized bass and the choir aahs. Meanwhile, Phantom's 2011 show was a tour-de-force of a reasonable balance between music and motion (very reminiscent of 2003 and 1996), but much of that quality was buried beneath amplification and needless synthesized effects. And Madison's closer from 2011 COULD have been one of the strongest hits of the modern era if it hadn't been for the amplified soloists blaring on the sideline (great chops, good sound, but knocked out of tune by the fact that it was amplified). Multiple trumpets playing a double G have no business being amplified....AT ALL. That just takes me right out of the moment every single time I hear it. I personally have to go back to Phantom 08 to find a show that I feel like is the complete package, one that does not pander to taking advantage of every single rule change ALL AT THE SAME TIME like everyone else does today. And even in that show, I roll my eyes when "ssssnickt" happens. They could have achieved the same effect with the back end of a mallet and a suspended cymbal and saved $1,400.00. No, I didn't like Jagged Line. After watching that, the only thing I, a trained musician and drum corps aficionado can tell you about Jagged Line is that there was a $60,000.00 prop in the middle of the field and that the solos were ruined by a vocoder. It's simply to the point where a lot of fans literally dread seeing and hearing a performance for the first time, and having to grit their teeth throughout to try to muscle through what they can't stand in order to try to enjoy the things they can. I didn't just wake up one morning and decide that I hated all this crap they're artificially injecting into drum corps. I gave concert horns a chance, and they just keep adding more and more needless instruments. I gave amplification a chance, and they just kept adding more and more needless effects and synthesizers. We dinos gave them an inch, and DCI took a million miles. I for one, am fed up of self-imposed concessions and compromises simply to belong to an activity that none of the fans and vets I grew up with can even stand to talk about anymore. It's time for DCI to start listening to the voices of those who helped, in whatever small way, to put them on the map, and to start doing a little conceding and compromising of their own. OR, change the name of the organization to Fine Arts International, and discontinue calling itself something it stopped being years ago.

Clicking the "edit" button is actually causing it to "quote" instead.

Sorry for the double posts, btw.

Oh I know about your group on Reddit, and what a CJ it is for amps and spandex. I also know that not ALL of the members of corps like the direction they are being led in on the field, but their choice is to either participate in their life-long dream, or don't. I had to make that same choice myself in my college marching band, a choice I still haven't come to terms with. You can't label concrete statements like what you've typed above as objective, OR critical thinking. I concede that not everyone is disenfranchised by the modern activity, and I never said otherwise. OF COURSE a lot of people posting here are fine with it, otherwise they wouldn't even be here. After all, this is one of the only outlets for drum corps fans, besides r/drumcorps. However, it should be much more telling that so many here are NOT fine with it, and it should also stand to reason that the vast majority of those who gave up on drum corps years ago as a result of this stuff aren't posting here. Stop trying to act like we're the minority simply because people are still attending shows, and try to consider what attendance would look like WITHOUT all the extra crud that drove everyone else away. I mean, what, would ticketholders today stop supporting drum corps if amplification and leotards were regulated or banned? Is that what you think would happen? Because the vibe we're getting is that drum corps should be supported no matter what's happening on the field.......right? Or is amplification and winking at cameras implicit in that mandate? Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Even the trolls on here are entitled to their opinion......when they choose to actually opine rather than bait and flame. But if DCI and its patrons don't even want to explore the possibilities of what could have been (which essentially is the essence of this thread), then that's their loss. That's ALL of our loss, whether we like vocalists and dancing or not.

Watching Spirit on PBS in 1980 with the TV turned all the way up. Granted, my four year-old mind actually thought they were soldiers, and that the horns were their weapons.

I'm trying to remember what I had to do when PBS charged me to watch drum corps after I cancelled my subscription. Oh, wait, it's all coming back to me now. They didn't charge me a dime, because it didn't cost anything.

Anyway OP, I've put a lot of thought and time into illustrating why I strongly believe a lot of potential was squandered and sacrificed for "evolution", and a few others put in zero thought and time into pretending to be offended by common sense and demonstrable truth. I hope ultimately your question has been answered.

Be advised Jeff, you're now on my ignore list. I don't have time to bandy crooked words with trolling contrarians not interested in rational discourse.

I've got just enough percussion knowledge to know you're talking a lot of bollocks to fit your narrative. Most vets have knee and back problems as well. We going to sideline kids and sit them down in a concert arc to protect them from the dangers of the human body wearing out as they get older (which is EXACTLY what's going to happen as a result of all the gesticulating and rolling around)? Is that your initiative? Because you can't have one without the other. It's just a load of hooey, and people with common sense already know that.

Pfft...only because you didn't think of it first. I've got YOUR number too, buddy. You're not insulted. You're just looking for something to report.

The front ensemble are perfectly capable of playing their marimbas, xylophones, glockenspiels, suspended cymbals, chimes, timpani and crotales without microphones and speakers, just like they did without issue for 25 years. All this BS about carpal tunnel and wear and tear on the instruments is little more than retcon to validate and justify how out of control it has become. There's an exponentially higher risk of electrocution today than a damaged wrist from playing arpeggios on a marimba...and the risk of electrocution isn't even that high. No, that's the same BS excuse as "bugles couldn't play in tune" to justify blowing a multi million dollar budget on soundboards and props.

Strongly disagree. I'll even go as far as to say that it can also apply to dinosaurs like myself. If I wasn't a drum corps addict, I wouldn't have spent the past 17 years taking abuse from yes-men who lack the conviction to stand up for what they claim to believe in. A lot of fans, like addicts, won't even try to be objective, nor will they try to apply common sense to their rhetoric. As far as they're concerned, the modern activity is simply wonderful, educational and enriching, because George Hopkins says it's wonderful, educational and enriching. Critical thinking and objectivity is the way forward, not bootlicking and pandering to WGI and BOA.

That's not at all surprising, since DCI has been assimilated into and taken over by BOA. It's just too bad so many are being turned away based upon their inability to fit in a ballerina leotard, rather than their musical aptitude.

I can't ever recall hearing a soloist miss a note because of radio frequency interference or a low battery. Until now....

I see absolutely no evidence that statement is true, based upon your post history. You like to dish it out, but you can't stand it when someone calls you out for it or gives it right back to you. All the replies you've made to what I've posted this week have been snark. Do not expect an absence of snark in turn. If corps (and the vets white-knighting for them) want to stop being ridiculed for wearing ballet leotards, then.....MAYBE.....they should stop wearing ballet leotards, and put some uniforms on. Or, keep looking ridiculous, and keep getting ridiculed as a result. Casuals looking at that photo won't say "Hey, there's the Cadets!". They'll say "Hey, there's a color guard playing horns......this must be from BOA regionals". Again, something to think about...