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DCIHasBeen

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Posts posted by DCIHasBeen

  1. Yeah, show went on. Vanguard always has great people working their shows...Really nice and friendly. Need a better stadium though...

    Alls I know is, when Vanguard hits the company front in "I Dreamed a Dream" at Finals, there will be much rejoicing and throwing of babies. This is the Les Mis show we've all been waiting 25+ years to see. This is balls-out drum corps.

    9129773254_5b83609589_b.jpg

    • Like 4
  2. Jesus....did Cadets tell the judge to listen to the source music????

    If it's not already done, judges should be required to listen to a corps source music before being allowed to make such a comment.

    Similar story with Crossmen back in '98, during the Rocco/DeLucia era...They were getting nailed by the judges for a drum break in the middle of one of the Metheny tunes...Even though it came right off the record.

    Personally, I would have just pulled a Woody Allen, told them they didn't know anything about Metheny, and they brought him to a critique.

  3. It's not just the arrangers...Judges tell the corps to do stupid things as well. Classic example? When Cadets did Adams' 'Short Ride on a Fast Machine', at least one judge told them that the woodblock had to go!

    There are other stories as well...Drum corps is a medium that's good at bastardizing a composer's work, then making it it unrecognizable, which is why some composers (like Ron Nelson) don't want their material done by drum corps.

  4. It's worth it to those who feel it is worth it.

    To me, all of the virtues found in drum corps can be found in other activities, at much more affordable costs. The activity itself has been largely unsustainable for years, and it's not going to get better.

    I think that's one of the reasons drum corps never got the kind of corporate support/backing that Bill Cook had envisioned would eventually become the norm: Cost per capita is too high, and it's easier to reach more kids, at a lower cost, by philanthropy to different types of arts organizations. Don't see that changing either.

    But for those who want to do it, the only way is to support the costs. It's not rocket surgery.

    • Like 1
  5. I did not get to see the clip, but the reactions here make it seem like it was Leni Riefenstahl creating the video.

    sjff_02_img0823.jpg

    No. If Riefenstahl made it, it would be original, emotionally stirring, and worthy of a brilliant filmmaker (She is widely acknowledged as genius, who used her talents for the wrong side...)

    The BD spot his just a bad attempt by lesser filmmakers to copy the style/tropes of Network Sports. Big difference.

    • Like 1
  6. Blue Devils. Congrats on becoming the Miami Heat of DCI.

    Everyone hates you because you're arrogant. You will probably win a lot and attract incredibly talented ring-chasers to your auditions. But most everyone still hates you.

    I don't think this has to do with arrogance from BD...It's the drum corps marketing equivalent of 'Monkey see, monkey do...". They think this is what will sell, and are copying Network TV sports programming...Without having the level of ad-minds behind it that the Networks do.

  7. Here is a Marching Roundtable Podcast with GH talking about why he wants woodwinds.

    "For the future possibility of music education."

    "Drum corps, as it stands now, I dont think is really a viable, doesn't have a viable platform enough to go forward."

    "There is just not enough people who care about it anymore."

    All this and more here, My link

    ...And he's correct. But woodwinds isn't going to shift the balance...It just means fewer people will care because the product will lose the identity, and brand differentiation from marching band, that the few who are interested care about.

    The baby goes out the window with the bathwater.

    Sorry, George.

    • Like 2
  8. At one point, at least on the East Coast, it wasn't far from street gangs with instruments.

    I know some guys from one of 'the' senior corps in '75 that never went on the field unarmed...like guns and knives. Seriously.

    At one of Bayonne's home shows in the late '70s, a couple walked into Boston's ranks, not knowing that Boston took that as a cue to start a brawl...The 'BAC's attacked the couple, including a pregnant woman, and were it not for the intervention of a couple of guys from Sky (who could have probably taken on the entire corps, since Sky was a notoriously tough crew BITD), it would have ended badly for the couple.

    Boston was really a bunch of fringe-type nut cases bitd, and that had more to do with them not making finals in the late '70s than anything else...That changed, in the '80s, though, with new management, and a much healthier outlook and direction.

    There's a story of legend involving the Bridgemen at the '69 Garden State Championships that involved a huge field brawl. Maybe one of my other fellow alums, who was there, could chime in.

    The 'good old days' had a lot of elements that weren't really all that good...But the music was great, and that's the part I prefer to remember!

    • Like 2
  9. I go back to the early '70s...Really think the activity started getting interesting from a musical standpoint around '72...Hawthorne Cabs on the Sr. Level had a ground-breaking show, and then there was everything going on in DCI.

    '74 Vanguard changed the game, as did '76 Devils ... The '80s and '90s were magic.

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