What does Phantom Regiment have to do to win?

[dbc03]

Gahh...there it is again. Better. Better than what? Judges decide what "better" means. Judges don't design shows. Corps tends to come up with shows that look/sound remarkably like shows that have already met with competitive success, and then win with them. Even when Cadets got second, I firmly believe that it was in spite of the narration...that the corps underneath the controversy really was that talented. And the narration, itself, wasn't, IMO, "innovative." It was the weakest part of the program, as far as I could tell...and might have cost them the championship.

So...better. Better is an empty term, to me. I still think Regiment needs to define itself visually. The guard is getting there (aside from the unis, which I mentioned). The drill leaves something to be desired, even with the difficulty level being through the roof, they are not getting credit for it, so why do it?

Anyone who says they need to win early and often is right on target. Win. Win all the time. Change stuff if you want, but master everything along the way. Play every show like its the championship, and go for all the marbles. Yeah...there's something to that.

Do I care if they don't win? Not particularly. I enjoyed "On Air' thoroughly, but since this is the discussion...heh.

Better than the other corps. Like you said, currently their guard and drill are not on par with championship corps. So those areas need to be better.

[rmurrey74]

Any thoughts on who their new drill writer will be?

[PRPhan4ever]

Any thoughts on who their new drill writer will be?

Did NOT hear they were looking for anyone else! (YET!)

I thought this years drill, along with ALL the movement was quite impressive!

[Lincoln]

This past season they used a show design that was not as appreciated as their prior year (based on the commments on this board). Faust drew the audience into the story - it had beautiful music AND a story with a beginning, middle and end.

This past seaons wasn't a story but a "theme." As successful as they were as story tellers in 2006, would it have been easier for them to tell a story along with the Birds theme? They still had beautiful music this year and to me, have helped to advance the musicality of field percussion (Vespertine Formations will go down as one of the most beautiful percussion pieces ever performed on the field).

They also had an extremely difficult program performed at a very high level. IMO they weren't as appreciated by the judges as was deserved.

They have everything in place to do well right now - almost every caption has matured into "championship" caliber. And to top it off, they have the crowd behind them - wanting them to do well.

One thing I appreciate so much about Phantom is how they mix both old and new classics - in addition to introducing the listener to something they might not have listed to before. I don't want to see Sparticus done on the field again. Let it rest as a classic show that changed the activity. To me, history shows that you can't go back to past glories expecting to attain the same level of appreciation.

I think Phantom has great things coming.......

[year1buick]

Any thoughts on who their new drill writer will be?

I thought this was just a rumor someone threw out. Has there been any announcement from the corps that they're going with someone else?

[saxmanjames7]

BD's, Cavies', and Cadets' strategies are apparent in that they are running out of fingers for hardware. PR's strategy is one that nets them fan appreciation and 4th place. Fine--if that is what the corps truly wants, I'll accept it. But I'd prefer our name on that big, hideous trophy DCI calls it's championship trophy a few times.

I don't know about you, but I don't have 12 fingers... :P

[IllianaLancerContra]

They need to come out strong, with a show that can grow over the season. It has to be clean. It has to have several (four-six) moments where the music and visual gell together and everyone says oooh. Andone of those moments need to be in the first 45 seconds, and two or three in the last min and a half.

[Trumpet Pops]

I am a huge Phantom Phan, but their visual just needs to be more CRISP, something they did not have this year. To ethereal which is consistent with their music this year. The other corps scoring above them had a more CRISP presentation. Musically, I believe Phantom beat everyone's pants off.

[Peel Paint]

They also had an extremely difficult program performed at a very high level. IMO they weren't as appreciated by the judges as was deserved.

They have everything in place to do well right now - almost every caption has matured into "championship" caliber. And to top it off, they have the crowd behind them - wanting them to do well.

The last corps to ascend to the top group and stay there consistently and start winning championships, The Cavaliers, went through this same process and were at this same point you mention as well from the late 1980s-early 1990s. Sometimes it takes a few years of consistency and staff maturity to really get all the t's crossed and i's dotted not only on the field, but more importantly, in the judges' eyes and ears. You don't necessarily get full credit the first year or two you start nailing it. Some judges may not be just scoring the current edition of the show as they're supposed to do, and as other judges do.

And by the way, Phantom has been a crowd favorite in the 2000s, but if you go back to the Spartacus years and before, that was not always the case. More than a few fans really disliked them for various reasons back in the 1970s and 1980s.

Edited September 7, 2007 by Peel Paint

[euponitone]

Well, to the person who mentioned all the changes in their shows from the beginning of tour to the end I say you are right on.

I think their August versions of their shows have been magnificent, especially in recent years because we are talking about the NOW. 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, and now 2007 are all amazing shows. I listen to 03 all the time, and 05 was one of my favorite shows ever. 06 definitely came close to winning, and I would have put them in the winner's circle that night.

But for Phantom they always seem to start slowly. They are usually 2 to 3 points behind the competition either at the beginning of the season, or after just a few weeks, and then they find themselves trying to pull every trick out of the hat to catch up. Some of this is fine, especially when dealing with GE, but some of it can help or harm a corps when it comes to the visual design. If you are constantly re-writing and tweaking the visual, re-teaching it because it was not working appropriately in the first place, and if you have to do this all summer it eventually takes away from time spent perfecting other areas of the corps' performance.

Of course, this is not a unique problem to Phantom as all corps deal with this. It comes down to how much and how do you fix the problem.

When I honestly and objectively assess other corps (without any personal bias), especially the top 3, I get better perspective on why they are successful.

Take the Cadets this year. OK, some liked the narration, some did not, but let's look at the other aspects. How much did their show really change this year? Some might say a lot, but I would bet the narration changed more than did the overall show. The musical charts that I heard from spring training and from their first show in Annapolis were largely what they presented at finals. The tag ending was slightly altered, and the ending of the second production was changed. Otherwise, very few musical changes, and that = more time to clean and perfect. As for visual, they took out the opening set of drill (with the Appalachian Spring segment), they changed the drill at the end of no. 2 to go along with the new music, and they added a new ending mid-season. That was it. Again, more time to clean. More time for the guard to catch up, more time for drums to perfect the music and visual. Changing the narration over the course of the summer was nothing. That's just one person or so learning new lines. Changing the other stuff, and how much and how often you change, is paramount to success. There is only so much time.

In 2006 Phantom was right where they needed to be, and they were close in 05, but some years it just feels as though they have to change too many facets of their show, and in the end corps that clean incredibly well, like Cavaliers, BD, Cadets, will almost always beat those who do NOT clean.

We can argue all day long about the worthiness and true ability to judge captions like GE, or what constitutes true demand, etc., but at the heart of competitive drum corps is excellence, which is defined by mastering one's show. Take BD this year. They perhaps did not have the most demanding show, the best overall GE, or the most entertaining show, but they were the BEST at execution of their show, and only the Cadets came close in that caption. To me, this was a battle of the BIG 2, Cadets and BD. They were the only two who truly seemed to master all aspects of their shows, and I mean MASTER. They cleaned their shows, put the spit and polish on them, and nailed them at semis and finals. Normally I would have the Cavaliers in their, but this year they failed to master their music captions like they typically do. Visual was not real clean at finals, although I loved their GE and Guard.

JW

I wanted to make a post, but i think you just did it for me. Sad as it seems, the days of coming out with your show as a bag of ### in the early season and cleaning and changing things like hell seems to be over (think cadets in the 80's and 90's). Now it seems that the corps that have to change the least, do the best throughout the year. With judges awarding cleanliness over demand (more-so this year than ever), the levels of perfection needed to win can only be reached by an entire summer of cleaning. Taking my own experience into account, I think you nailed it with the cadets 07 analogy. They came out with a complete show basically, and apart from adding a few counts here and there, the only changes made were either cuts to the narration, or the watering of parts. This obviously worked for them, as they had (arguably) the best show on the field this summer. If you look at 05, the same thing happened. We, quite literally, finished the season with the same show we started. Music was edited in some spots, visual effects were added, but there were no new endings to anything (other than a 4 count spin in liquid), no major musical or drill rewrites, just lots of cleaning, which led to a very high score. In the other years i marched, we were considerably less prepared, made tons of changes, and it showed.

What does PR need to do?...Come out with the best product possible, convince the judges that its the hardest show on the field that year, and then make cuts and clean it so its also the best. No big deal really....except theres about 6 other groups gunning for the same thing.... :)