JustEnjoyIt

Phantom Cadets Bluecoats (This took a while to grow on me... but I'm glad it did! Fully appreciate it now.) Blue Stars (Solely for the ballad.) Boston (I'm simple... if you play On The Waterfront, I WILL love it.) Kills me to not have Crown in the top 2/3, let alone the top 5... The show just never clicked with me this year, though I still feel things are heading back in the right direction for Crown.

"Way Down Hadestown" could be a lot of fun if done the right way. I'd love to see some of this make it to the field one day, really a fantastic show.

My opinion: Texas Indiana California Oklahoma Illinois After that, 5-10 are a bit more difficult to list. Florida and Ohio have a few really good groups. Kentucky and Michigan both also hold up pretty well. To round out the top 10, maybe Missouri?

Let it come. Nothing gets me riled up like a nice marching band sound preference debate.

Most butts are in the stands listening to the whole, not camped out in the warm-ups. That said, WGI does pretty well on the percussion side if we want to look at if people want to hear pits or not. I also want to combat a tone that was woven into this thread. Members in the top groups choose and work hard to be in those pits. Not settle for being in them. As far as them not taking breaks in playing as opposed to the battery or brass - that's because they're not marching around the field. Of course they're going to play more. Their voice is able to tie those moments together to help move the show along. In modern ensembles, which the members and audience seems to like, the pit is an equally important voice that plays many parts. Sometimes it's accompaniment for the brass, sometimes accompaniment for the battery, sometimes accompaniment for both. Sometimes it's a co-voice that carries through equally important melodic lines, and yes, sometimes it's the melodic focus as well. I can't help but think of how less-exciting Bluecoats would've been last year without their pit, or how Phantom 2010 would've been without that glorious front ensemble writing. Crown from 2006 -2009, with sweeping pit moments. Blue Knights the past few years have been super tasty in their percussion writing (to my preference, to be fair), and the entire ensemble fits so well for their style. The pit helps tie that together just as the brass or battery does. It is equally important to be heard in the ensemble as a whole.

Top 3 for me: 1st by a mile: 2016 - Relentless - I just love everything about this show. Music, visuals, guard, it's just the complete package for me. 2nd: 2009 - The Grass is Always Greener - The little celeste moment.... 3rd: 2017 - It Is - I didn't care for it much at first, but it has grown on me a lot. If it had just a few things tweaked... it could have been so much better. Other bits and pieces I've loved from Crown over the years: - 2008's Candide opening - melted me away in person! - 2007's Wild Horses - 2005's Angel - All of 2013/2014

Just showing Spartans a little love after their great season this past year! It's just a cropped version of their main logo.

Isn't that basically what this entire activity is, though? Goodness. It's a positive video of someone being introduced to an activity we all ourselves love. She seemed to have fun with it! We could all learn to have more of that "fun" thing.

Bluecoats 2015 Carolina Crown 2016 Bluecoats 2017 Had a hard time deciding between doing BK 2014 at the start of that list, or Bluecoats at the end with 2017. Had to go with Bluecoats 2017, I just love the music so much that it alone could get me through quarantine. Honorable Mention (Please don't crucify me, just listing for fun!): Cavaliers 2008 Carolina Crown 2009 Phantom Regiment 2010

The Silent Summer Make donations. Not just to your favorites. We all need to stick together as one community during this time. Everyone stay safe, act wisely, and keep everything in perspective.

Regardless of how you feel about those statements, when it originally started, it started with one case jumping species. Everything came from that in the end.

You don't need planeloads coming from Wuhan. It started in China with ONE case. It then blew up across all of China - which it's nice to mention that China and US have very close to the same land area. As others have mentioned, though, this comparison only means things would more slowly spread in the US. Which is a GOOD thing for hospital resources, and is exactly what people are hoping for. It is a BAD thing for the potential upcoming season. Even if everyone at the start of the season is 100% free from the virus, it is guaranteed at least one person will catch it during the tour. They are around a lot more people than just those immediately around them on the field, and it will absolutely enter into one of the groups. That group will then need to be put on quarantine. Not to mention the fans. Go to an event like this, and someone in the crowd will almost be guaranteed to have it. Here in China, we are back to work. I've been back to work for about 3 weeks now. Some here just started back today. Others are still unable to start back to work. It is not like flipping a switch and everyone gets back to work immediately, or at least it SHOULDN'T be. If it is, then get ready for Quarantine Part 2 in a few weeks when it cycles back around. This would only apply if the US is 100% copying how Chinese cities have responded to this. It should absolutely be assumed that the report-to-peak cycle will be different. Even under the best of circumstances, the peak would be different between two different nations. The US is NOT handling this situation well, though. I've previously talked about how Wuhan handled the situation vs. the city where I've lived now for a few years - Shanghai. For those interested, click here. So let me now talk about how the US is handling it as well. I'll use NYC, simply due to the sizes being the only thing close enough in scale. Shanghai: Population - 25 Million, COVID-19 Cases - 370, COVID-19 Deaths - 3 Beijing: Population - 21.5 Million, COVID-19 Cases - 512, COVID-19 Deaths - 8 NYC: Population - 8.6 Million, COVID-19 Cases - 11,000, COVID-19 Deaths - 63 Not every city in China has handled it as well as Shanghai and Beijing (to a lesser extent), obviously. But not every city in the US is handling it as well as NYC, either. Back to my area now. When this virus entered Shanghai, it entered as one single case originally. When it entered NYC, it entered as one single case. It doesn't matter where those cases came from, but those numbers show something is not being done quite right. The US is not handling this well right now. Here in China, as I talked about in the previous post, I'm STILL having to have my temperature scanned multiple times each day and you're expected to wear a mask anytime you're outside of your home. I've now been back at work for 3 weeks now, after a full month of quarantine - which was originally mandated for everyone here. If you go from one city to another, you must quarantine for two weeks now. Doesn't matter if it's domestic or foreign travel. Fly from Beijing to Shanghai? That'll be two weeks in home-quarantine. Fly from Bangkok to Shanghai? Two weeks in a hotel quarantine near the airports. I look at how the US is handling things, and I look at how China's largest cities are handling things... If you think the US is going to be seeing the same peak... a rude awakening is in store. It's nowhere near over here in China, and the US has a long ways to go as well. Even when it calms past the peak, it still would be unwise to do a tour. Should the members remain safe, with them going state to state like they do - it could just end up carrying the virus even more than it already has been. That can happen even if we're past the 'peak'. This isn't a call to PANIC PANIC PANIC!! But we need to not constantly brush concerns aside and be so dismissive when there's no grasp on the true reality we're now living in. I do not want the season cancelled. I understand the entire activity could be at risk should that be what happens. But more and more I'm not seeing how it can continue. Corps housing may be one of the biggest challenges, but we have to first look at the safety challenge itself.

The biggest overreaction? I wish the country where I'm living had've "overreacted". If they did, then the world wouldn't be going through what it currently is. Instead, things were covered up in an attempt to calm the public. Now we have a global pandemic. Let me give you a tale of two cities where I live - China. Wuhan has a population of 11 million people, with 68,000 cases and 3,000 deaths1 (per the entire province of Hubei). Though, I do highly suspect the deaths and cases are both far greater than what has been reported... as Italy is now approaching 1,000 deaths itself... but lets leave that discussion out. Shanghai - where I live - has a population of 25 million people, with less than 350 cases, and (as far as I know) less than 5 deaths. Wuhan's government initially tried to cover up that this existed. They did so for about a month, at least. This lead to it spreading, and now we see where it's at. Shanghai's government took the exact opposite approach. It basically completely shut down. Everything closed down at the very first sign of a case - all here in the economic center of the world's second largest economy. We've had to close entire districts - millions of people - due to one single case popping up. We've had to shut down everything and push everyone to stay at home for weeks and weeks. No restaurants, no stores, no going outside unless you are buying groceries. You get your temperature scanned before you go into any store, before you are allowed into your apartment community, before you enter your office area, before you enter your office itself. You get work documents that show records from your phone company that prove you've been remaining within a certain area. You get work documents tracking your temperature history over weeks. I can't even walk my dogs without wearing a mask (respirator) of some kind, they simply won't let you back in knowing you went out without one. Some of those things might also be taken as "overreaction", but it has kept my city from turning into what happened in Wuhan (which again, is less than half the size - so you can imagine what could have happened here). For those of you being critical of what these organizations are doing, you need to be THANKFUL that they are stepping up and doing this. That is being proactive. If you start being REACTIVE then that is when things are going to crumble, and quickly. If organizations do not step up as they are right now, then you might very well have to see what I've seen here with cities doing these "overreactions". Don't let it get to that point. Be happy that people are stepping up now before it gets to that point - because I can assure you it's not super fun. Additionally, these precautions are being taken to PREVENT the spread. Not just to keep someone from getting sick at the event, but to keep others that might not even have symptoms from spreading it to others. For those saying "OH but seasonal influenza kills many more people!" Yes, the seasonal flu has killed more people in the US so far this year. If this spreads to the same level that influenza has, then you will not like the numbers coming from it. The seasonal flu has a death rate of .1% (I believe this year it is actually .06%, but I may be wrong with that), and is uncontainable. Coronavirus has had a death rate of 3.4%2 (Just under 15% for those over the age of 80), and is still at a point where it can be contained - though that slips by daily. If these events (WGI, and many other expos and other events) do not step up as they have, then you would be spreading something with that death rate. Yes, it is primarily fatal in those who are older or immunocompromised, but we have seen young doctors dying here in China as well. We have seen young people dying all across the world. The virus can attach and linger on without any symptoms for at least two weeks3 - though it is expected it can survive even longer than two weeks (as a comparison, the seasonal flu has an incubation period of 2 to 4 days4). Going to one of those events, you can have it attach to you and then you walk out and spread it along without having a single clue of doing so. The numbers aren't as high as the seasonal flu, but now you see that it has the potential to be an absolute nightmare if it spreads - and it is much easier to spread than the seasonal flu. Let there be an overreaction so that the US does not become what China was, and what other nations are now becoming. Take the overreactions as a good thing. It's a luxury to look back and say "wow, that wasn't as bad as I expected it to be". Don't go out and panic, don't go and spread fear, but realize that this is absolutely something that needs to be combatted and have proactive measures taken against. It is very real, and hard decisions need to be made. Lastly, no the media is not going crazy with it - as was stated earlier in the thread. They have simply been reporting what is actually happening around the world with it. Sorry if I rambled a bit, but I do get a bit heated reading through this thread and seeing several people wanting to act as if this is not serious. If you fail to be proactive, you're not going to like where things go from here. Sources - So I can't be slapped with the sarcastic comments about suddenly being a specialist: 1: http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2020-03/11/c_138865315.htm (Note: Chinese English state-run news source, take that for what you will) 2: https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-opening-remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-covid-19---3-march-2020 (Also read the talks of how it can be contained, which precautions are needed to accomplish) 3: https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/q-a-coronaviruses 4: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/influenza-(seasonal)

Ah yes! The old tried, true, and tested "lets have a virus strain jump species, cross oceans, kill people, and impact literally every organization and nation so that we can justify lower scores for how we blow air through metal, slam wood on things, and work up that good-good sweat while running (accompanied by the ever classic spinning pretty colors)" excuse. I'll never forget the time that Blue Stars used that same excuse in 1908. True story, but don't look it up. tl;dr - Get a grip. Seriously. You need to get your priorities checked if you're upset over this.

Dude. It's Spongebob. Relax. Not quite the same as asking to throw band directors - you know, the ones who teach those who go on to do drum corps - into the cutely animated jellyfish fire.