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bartyount

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Posts posted by bartyount

  1. I think it looks silly and it's distracting.

    Ok, now why is that? Because in our society, dresses are not appropriate dress for men. So unless they are trying to make a specfic point about how we shouldn't have that particular standard in our society, they are taking away from the effect of their program by creating a distraction.

    If the show were based on the movie "Some Like it Hot" then it would be appropriate to have male members in dresses because it would contribute positively to the point of the program.

    About Academy - my sister and I discussed whether they were using a certain cultural garb that was appropriate for men but we weren't sure. From gimpy's post above, referring to the Turkish clothes it seems that it may be that that is what they were going for. Can someone confirm?

  2. By every definition I could find, drumcorps is a sport.

    Generally, a sport is an activity requiring some physical skill in the form of some competition. Drumcorps fits well within this.

    American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language:

    Physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively.

    Macmillan Dictionary:

    an activity in which players or teams compete against each other, usually an activity that involves physical effort.

    Cambridge International Dictionary of English:

    a game, competition or activity needing physical effort and skill that is played or done according to rules, for enjoyment and/or as a job

    Webster's New World College Dictionary:

    such an activity, esp. when competitive, requiring more or less vigorous bodily exertion and carried on, sometimes as a profession, according to some traditional form or set of rules

  3. <Bluecoats 92 - "Jazzaphonic" - Beatles>

    I wondered if someone was going to mention this one. Like the Madison 76 memory, this one is right up there, though for a different reason:

    Once again, an early season how - Detroit area, I think - and I'm watching from the end zone behind the chain link. You guys are working toward the end of your opener...I can tell the design is intended to illicit much cheering and baby-throwing (now discourage, I understand...) from the adoring fans. You release that wonderful note...and all that can be heard are the lights, buzzing in the night.

    I had to run away to keep from laughing out loud over the disconnect between the designer's intent, and the 'HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM' that greeted their best efforts.

    I'm sorry...but that memory still makes me smile...

    not schadenfreude...but just...funny!

    Haha - that is funny. Trust me - we had many moments like that. Like I said - can you imagine the dumbfounded look on people's faces when we're playing some crazy psychodelic arrangement of Eleanor Rigby for 4th of July? :tongue:

    We took in stride - we all understood that the audience didn't get it - because we didn't get it ourselves. :tongue:

  4. Bluecoats 92 - "Jazzaphonic" - Beatles

    When I first heard that Bluecoats were going to do play Beatles I thought that would be awesome (I've heard some really great jazz versions of some of their songs). First time playing through the show with the corps at rehearsal in early June - it was like - WTF was that?!

    Then imagine playing our opener - a seemingly (possibly actually) drug influenced arrangement of Eleanor Rigby for a July 4th parade. I guess no one saw the big FAIL sign on that one. :tongue:

    Yet - as crazy as that show arrangement was - I still enjoy listening to it.

  5. Phantom 09 - the show early season was an absolute mess. Hats off to the performers who had a hell of a summer trying to get all the fixes coming from the staff. But no one could have came away with a good showing at finals when you are rewriting practically half of the show in mid July.

    I will always respect those performers for still performing the best they could!

    I guess I'm just wierd because apparently I'm the only person that liked Phantom's 2009 show. :tongue:

  6. And yet they fell from 4th to 7th because of a major pile-up of good-to-great corps/shows.

    I was on tour with them for the last two weeks of tour and while I was initially really disappointed that they fell so far finals week. But that disappointment was short-lived and I am really proud that they performed probably better than any Bluecoats corps before them despitethe placement.

    I also realized the competition was so close that the 4 through 7 group could have landed in any order that night. The other groups just happened to have a slight edge that night. When the competition is that close - a slight edge can cause a drastic change in placement, but that's ok. In my mind (and hopefully in the minds of the members) it doesn't take away from the fact that they still had the best show that Bluecoats have ever fielded (design and performance).

    The 4 through 7 group were all incredible shows. Those are the ones I will remember most from that season. They should have been 1 through 4 in my opinion.

    Sorry - that was sort of rambling...

  7. have seen bloo twice this year, and both times have left me thinking that the ending needs to be more...dunno what more..just more.

    When has any drumcorps not changed their ending by the end of the season? :smile:

    It's used as a tactic by most corps now. They purposely design a sort of sub-par ending to start the season with so that two or three weeks before the end of the season they can change it to something more GEish to get a boost in their scores.

  8. pretty sure Crossmen do a large chunk of their spring training on turf in Texas...

    When I marched Sky Ryders in 90 and 91, our base was DeSoto High School in Texas outside of Dallas.

    Their stadium was turf but we didn't usually practice on it during the midday practice block because of the heat. But when we did, I can tell you it was boiling hot. We had a member who's feet were burning through her shoes and had to leave to get better shoes. The bottoms of the ones she was wearing were literally melted.

    We also had to take a break about every 10 minutes or so. We kind of hyped on facing the adversity of the heat though.

    At one point, we ran a section of the show that we had been having trouble with and the staff flipped out at how we supposedly sucked at that run and started yelling at us to get up on the track to do basics (as punishment). We all ran up on the track and some of the other staff had been hiding behind the stands and they ran out with water hoses and started spraying us all down.

    Good times, good times... :smile:

  9. So, did you like the chairs last year? No? how about 2 years ago? I think that the BD show is the most innovative show in years, and they did it 2 years in a row. However, I can see how a lot of people cannot handle innovation or new direction.

    How many times does one have to say that it's their personal taste and their personal opinion before they don't get crap from someone?

  10. I know that 07 was disappointing at the end but it's still one of the Bluecoats best remembered seasons- NOT because they "peaked at Quarters" but because they were incredible all summer.

    In my mind, the 07 show is the best Bluecoats have ever done - which seems strange considering the placement is only sort of "average" for the corps over the last several years.

  11. Coats got completely hosed in '07. I absolutely HATE it when people spout about judging conspiracies, but something was up.

    Granted, but to put things into perspective as far as placement, the 4th through 7th place corps were all within a point of each other. Being that close, the placement of those 4 spots could have landed anywhere. Unfortunately for Bluecoats, they ended up at the bottom of that pile.

    I like to think of it as the best 7th place corps ever. :tongue:

  12. First - a person should have the freedom to choose to go where they want regardless of where they've been in the past. You may agree with their choices or not, but it's ultimately their decision (there should not be rules to restrict movement between corps).

    Second - I used to put more stock in "corps loyalty", but after awhile I realized that alot of corps are willing to dump a vet for a more talented rookie. So if there's no loyalty from the corps to the members, why should there be loyalty from members to the corps?

  13. We don't have a Blu-Ray player, just a regular DVD player. We got a new LED TV recently, and most of our mass-market DVDs look quite good on it. But I'm a little surprised at how grainy my 2009 finals DVD looks. I thought this year's edition was supposed to be high-def? Admittedly, it looks better than the 2008 edition, which really looks grainy now. Should've kept our old TV for my DCI DVDs, LOL!

    The grainy look is due to digital compression. I assume this is done because of the amount of data they need to get on the discs. The problem becomes more pronounced on a bigger screen. Hopefully the BR Discs won't have this problem.

  14. For all of you who ever buy tickets from a scalper (or "individually run ticket exchange service"), the money you are spending does NOT go to support drum corps.

    How's that? The tickets bought from individuals have already been bought from TM or DCI or a corps. So they get their money no matter what.

    The "scalper" scene is basically just people selling tickets that they bought but then can't use. I've never paid more than face value for a ticket and I've gotten most from individuals.

  15. Every Blu Ray set that is over $100 is either a special 'collector's edition' of something that has many additional features included in the box, or is something with MULTIPLE SEASONS worth of video. Compared to DCI, which has what, 5 hours worth if you watched multi-cam and high cam back to back?

    Compare that to, for example, the Dexter season 1-3 set, with 9 BDs, and roughly 30 hours worth of content. You have to go significantly lower price to even find a set below 3 discs in the box.

    You're comparing mass market DVDs to niche market dics. There's no way DCI can afford to produce BR discs at mass market prices.

    I'm actually pleasently surprised with the $99-$119 price. I figured it would be much higher. With such a limited run, I'll bet they're just

    breaking even on costs and using this as a market testcase.

  16. It's great that they're producing the BR discs so soon. I thought it would be a few years.

    I'm kindof annoyed though that they let us buy the SD version and then offer the Blu version later.

    Well at least they offered a discount.

    I guess they're using the 09 limited run discs to test the market. Thing is though that people like

    me who have the SD version I'm guessing will just pass on the 09s and start going Blu with 2010.

    Now something that I would really like to see is if they go back and do all of the past years in Blu.

    That would be cool because the quality of the DVDs are pretty cruddy - too much video compression.

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