Matt_S

Seriously? You're going to thank him for a post like that? Read my tax return. If I lost my employment I'd be in deep ####. That's my source of income. Thankfully, I have my job, and can cover my expenses. Hypothetically, if I lost my job and continued my current expenses then I'd certainly be living beyond my means. But the situation is hypothetical only. If I lost my job I'd obviously cut down on my expenses to compensate. It'd be tough, but I have also invested in myself over the years (i.e., with my college degree) so that I will be able to find a new job and a new source of income. If you need the analogy explained any more explicitly, just let me know.

But the Blue Devils are NOT consistently ranked 15th. They haven't been placed in double digits since 1973. That's twice as old as some of today's marching members. The Blue Devils are consistently ranked in the top three or four, placing as low as fifth only one time since 1974. That's not competition, that's dominance. If the success of the Blue Devils were a one-time phenomenon, and corresponded with a one-time surge in popularity, then you'd probably be right about the fact that competitive success was the primary cause. But, with the obvious exceptions of Crown and the Bluecoats, the G7 members have been successful for more than a generation. That success cannot be attributed to chance alone, which means that competitive success cannot be the only variable in play here. Clearly there is something about these organizations that keeps them successful, year after year, decade after decade. If I'm a prospective marcher, then I want to be a part of that excellence. Competitive success and marching interest may be correlated, but they are symptoms of the same primary cause. I don't see how there can be any argument to the contrary.

Thanks for the chuckle Jeff. I'm going to remember that line the next time someone says that the loss of the G7 will be the death of any non-G7 corps.

Star 1993 Blue Devils 1999 Cavaliers 2002 Cadets 2005 Phantom 2008 the Blue Devils pick is a bit of a homer selection for me - it's first DCI show I ever saw, and hooked me on the activity. You could replace it with Madison 1995 if you feel so inclined. I would also be fine switching in Cadets 2000 for Cadets 2005. Both shows are deserving, and either would be a fine choice.

Yeah, I think I can make it there by 6, if I go into work a little earlier. Sounds like I've found my first taste of drum corps for the summer.

Heh, that's quite a gallery Mike. I don't think it's at all controversial to say that 2007 was certainly the worst of the bunch. I might get argument on this one, but I think the 2003-2005 uniforms were actually my favorite.

In that case, you had also received drum corps exposure before you were college-aged. That was the aim of my post. There's no reason to target college kids, if you make the effort to target them earlier. I think it'd be great if thousands of kids could say they knew about drum corps before high school, just as you did. As for the kids in your area who don't know about drum corps, that sounds like missed opportunity to me. The first step toward selling our activity, whether to a band kid or otherwise, is exposure. PS FWIW, after coming from a highly competitive high school band, I admit I viewed my college's marching band as beneath me. That was a mistake. Looking back now, I regret missing out on the experiences I could have had, if only my attitude had been different.

If you want to justify transfer policies or finder's fees, then you're going to need something a lot better than the comment that corps hopping is "easy to do"

That's not a root cause.

I've seen a lot of talk of Lean Six Sigma in this thread. Why not apply some root cause analysis to "corps hopping"? I doubt that any kid is leaving his corps just to keep that corps down. This is not only a voluntary activity, but an activity that demands a huge commitment in time, money and effort. I doubt that most kids are making those commitments lightly. Before you convince me that corps hopping is a problem, I'd like to learn why kids are corps hopping in the first place.

As a general rule, college students were high school students first. These are two overlapping populations, separated only by time. Everyone I personally knew who went on to march drum corps did so after graduating. They were a part of the majority of marching members who are college-aged, but they wouldn't have marched or contributed to the activity without the exposure they received in high school.

Wow. When you say that, it makes it painfully clear that you didn't understand at all what I said. Let me put it in more simple terms: You don't help lower-tier corps by making it harder to march with the Blue Devils. All you accomplish is that you make it harder to march with the Blue Devils.

I'm truly sorry to hear about this John. My thoughts go out to you.

A "finder's fee" would only make it that much harder for lower-tiered corps to attract membership. By charging the Blue Devils a fee for accepting a kid with one of those corps on his/her resume, you've disincentivized the Blue Devils from engaging that particular behavior. You've encouraged them to take instead the equally talented kid with no drum corps experience. If I just got cut from my top choice, let's just say the Blue Devils, then I have two options: I could march somewhere else or take the summer off. Sure, if I marched with Pacific Crest or the Mandarins or the Cascades I'd probably get better. But I would also increase the cost to the Blue Devils of accepting me by whatever arbitrary amount is proscribed. If I plan to try again for the Blue Devils next year, then under the "finder's fee" system I would choose to stay home, and try to get better on my own. So many on DCP already complain about a "top corps or bust" mentality among auditionees; a "finder's fee" would only exacerbate the problem. Conversely, you've also incentivized membership turnover within the lower-tiered corps. If a kid leaves to march somewhere else then that's cash going directly to the lower corps' pocket. I can't think of a better way to encourage these lower-tiered corps to adopt a permanent feeder-corps position within the DCI structure.

I'm sorry, do you really believe World Class corps do equal work to bring in revenue?

Closed per author's request.

I didn't see anything about it on Madison's home page. Are their practices open to the public? What's the practice schedule? I'm not far from Bloomington, might check it out if they're going to be there for a while.

How is that different from greed, a motivation which you rejected? Not asking that to be accusing, but for you to expound on what you've just said.

Hehe, it was a fun read, sort of a stream-of-consciousness post where ideas are thrown out there. It sounds like a conversation that might be had by two friends over a beer. I'll buy the first round, if you're in town this summer. For me today, I keep coming back to the fact that a business plan was approved 8-1 by a DCI board with four G7 directors on it. Now, all four of those guys are gone. That's a pretty sharp change of course. Dan and George are probably both spinning mind games for us, but I have to think this is something bigger than just the two of them.

The G7 proposal is a power grab, as it is proposal for more power for the G7 corps. This is an incontrovertible statement of fact. The discussion lies in whether this demand for additional power is justified, what motivates it, and whether granting this request will ultimately benefit the activity. The immediate reaction on DCP was that this demand was motivated by greed and greed alone. This explanation will always strike me as too convenient and lazy, like a union calling out their company for being greedy while at the same time demanding greater pay for themselves. For what it's worth, I agree with your side note completely. If you are committed to those words, then we at least agree on the motivation for the proposal, even while we have different thoughts regarding its justification and benefit. It doesn't appear that all of DCP is with us on that point, which is unfortunate. If a person cannot imagine any motivation for this proposal other than greed and avarice, then an honest discussion of both the merits and deficiencies of this proposal can never take place. If everyone leaned the same way but for us outsiders on DCP, there wouldn't be a controversy in the first place. George Hopkins is close to this. Jim Coates is close to this. Jeff Fiedler is close to this. Rick Valenzuela is close to this. David Glasgow is close to this. Without assuming that they support the proposal in full, I think it's at least fair to say they support changes to the current model. (Of course, then there's that line in the powerpoint presentation which says these directors have already taken the proposal to their boards and have their backing.) If you truly believe that these men are not acting out of greed alone, then there must be an identifiable reason they feel this way. If we can determine what that reason is, we will likely then have a better understanding of why these men think the future of drum corps is in another direction than the one being promoted by DCI.

As a reminder, please take off-topic personal disputes to PM.

Don't worry Sue, it was sarcasm. What he said was a reference (dig) to the second post in this thread, where Ed from Kansas said "Let's hear it and support the real Junior Drum Corps and enjoy the activity and appreciate how hard the kids work" with regard to the non-G7 corps.

<moderator hat on> Guys, let's keep the off-topic stuff to a minimum please. Thanks

I would go if this event were taking place near me. I look forward to reading reviews from those who attend.

I have never said such a thing. I am firmly confident that everyone involved in DCI's decision-making process knows a great many more than I do about the situation. I do not limit this to only the G7 directors.