MikeD

I just saw that the Jimmy D'Amico has passed away. He was a Cadet in the early 50's, winning a bunch of championships and later was a member of the Cabs DCA corps. He returned to Garfield as their director in the late 60's, just prior to Hugh Mahon. He was a big part of the alumni corps more recently. Jimmy owned the Sub Base on River Road as his main business. I spent lots of time there over the years, especially when I was judging band shows in the 80's and 90's. A gentleman and a great person. RIP.

Millionaire business person Jim Jones started the Troopers in the early 60’s. He brought in top flight people like Don Angelica to get the corps off the ground.

This is getting close to what the numbers would be if Keith Richards was a marching music participant.

Like to see the Mandarins do Tan Dun's wonderful music from "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon". The Troopers cellist would have to move over to the Mandarins though, as the film score is full of cello solos by Yo Yo Ma. 😀 I arranged this music for the band I taught 10+ years ago, complete with cellist.

Been saying this since RAMD - Regiment is required to use Janacek’s “Sinfonietta”. They have not yet implemented that requirement. 😀

No...just REAL old!

Marched drum corps 64-72 = 9 years Taught drum corps 76 and 77 = 2 years Judged drum corps 77-80 plus two DCA shows in 90 = 5 years Marched HS band 68-70 = 3 years Marched college MB 73 = 1 year Taught HS bands at every level from drum tech through band director 71-2017 = 47 years Judged HS band shows 77-2005 = 29 years

At the 1971 VFW Nats in Dallas, I overheard two Cotton Bowl staffers saying it was 135 on the field as we entered for prelims.

Yes, I remember those times in 1972.

Interesting. I was taught by Bobby Hoffman from 70-72 in Garfield, and I do not recall him yelling at us. Him yelling does not fit my own personal recollection of his teaching style. He could be sarcastic at times, and his comments could be cutting, but I do not recall yelling. Actually, our entire staff those three years were not "yellers" as has been described in this thread. I taught bands from 1971, my freshman year in college, through 2017. I was not the type of person to yell; it really does not accomplish anything, IMO.

A good portion of the Cadets drumline quit after 71 and joined the Cabs after Garfield fired George Tuthill, who also taught the cabs. We were basically 18/19 year-olds. After all who would want to play in a drumline taught by Bergenfield HS’s new band director, a guy named Fred Sanford. 😵‍

Ugh! My first thought before reading the links was that maybe the secret cult was just the marching band! 😀

It was a great move. I got to march that 1970 drill, my first year in Garfield. I still remember the huge number of flash bulbs from the sudience at the Orange Bowl for VFW Nats as we moved forward with the big hit. I also remember your great ending to John Sasso’s arrangement. Bobby created amazing visual programs all three years I marched with Garfield. We did the Peace Sign all three years, and every year the creation of the form was very different. The “America, the Brave” show from 1971 was an amazing program, and Bobby’s very different visual design really made the show special. Of course, his great visual programs for Bayonne cement his name as one of the greats. Many people do not remember his great “traffic jam” move when he wrote for the Skyliners.

Whatever he is doing is giving her theremin voice I guess.

We visited our next door neighbors who built a (for now) snowbird house in Punta Gorda. We had dinner one evening at a nice shopping area on the water. We then drove to Fort Lauderdale for a 9-day cruise on the Celebrity Reflection.

You live in Punta Gorda? We were just there for a couple of days a few weeks ago.

His salary at Trenton Central in the late 90's allowed him to do many of those other positions with top programs (e.g. North Penn)_ and the drum corps. Trenton Central had a very minimal music program, so little would have been expected of him in his "day job", sad to say. The school whose marching band I taught from 1994-2017, West Windsor-Plainsboro HS (South campus once the North campus was built), played Trenton in football, so I saw their marching band every year. While not world beaters, they were at least presentable in Larry's era.

He was also band director at Trenton Central HS before that.

You ARE young! When I marched, the corps drummers provided the “music” for the winterguards. I did that with the Garden State corps I belonged to in 68/69.

A great guy. I judged band shows with Bob from 79-94. RIP

The Blue Devils parent organization took over USBands. I wonder if they would desire to create a new drum corps organization if DCI were to fail.

Marking ticks was a woefully inaccurate method of judging performance levels, as percussion instrumentation expanded, visual designs became less linear and more complex, and brass charts became more horizontal and less vertical. Also, deciding what was and was not a tick was 100% subjective. How many ticks to assign in a group tick situation was also subjective. Field placement if the judge also played a role. A judge was supposed to be directly in front of the group being evaluated. If I was in front of the snares I was not supposed to mark a tenor tick, even if I heard something that might have warrented it. As to deciding what was and was not a tick… I taught and judged in the Garden State Circuit starting in 1976. The circuit was a class “B” circuit. The directors decided at the winter meetings to have judges use a “national linear” judging standard. That meant all corps were evaluated as if they were competing against the Blue Devils, SCV, Bayonne, Muchachos, etc…even the very beginners. That lasted 2 or 3 weeks into the season, as corps zeroed out on captions, and total scores tanked. They quickly reverted to a circuit linear concept, and scores went back up.

Agree with that, for sure. I know of some who moved around between the class 'A' level corps, but I agree it was much less back then. In the modern era of competitive MB, the whole model is different than back in the past. Lots of kids never did marching band pre-DCI; they started in small corps and maybe moved up. Those that did MB in that era most likely did not compete. MB and drum corps were more parallel activities then. Today, HS MB is the training ground and took the place of those small corps from pre-DCI (and even in the DCI era to an extent). Kids march 4 years of HS MB and then a year or two of drum corps.

Kids marched in more than one corps even pre-DCI. I marched in 3 corps from 64-72, and other people I know did similar moves. It was less unusual than many make it out to be. Kids did march longer in the past. Some of it was due to kids starting younger.

The 2009 Broadway revival, directed by Arthur Laurents himself, had some Spanish in it. Maria (incredible Josephina Scaglione), sang “I Feel Pretty” in Spanish. It was beautiful. My son’s wife was a Production Assistant on the show. We got to attend the dress rehearsal. Laurents came out and spoke to the audience. He noted some of the changes he made to the original show he wrote in the 50’s as well as the Spanish singing. He said he saw no reason personally to just recreate his original; he wad 92 at the time.