lowend Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 (edited) I personally don't believe so. Sure, many members of smaller/younger/lower placing corps eventually march the corps of their dreams, but considering that a corps like Cavaliers had 700 auditionees last year, those top corps would still fill up their ranks with top-notch talent.This never gets much publicity, but some times, marchers from corps at the very top leave to march other corps for whatever reason. Interesting stat about the Cavies audition numbers. I think a better question would be this: would the top corps still be as good without the college age music ed/performance major rookouts? Edited August 31, 2008 by lowend Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L1STEN2311 Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 No. Individual corps are better when the activity is stronger at every level -- including division II/IIIs (or whatever they're called this week), "all ages," and alumni corps. well, yes that also makes sense... but I meant in the way that auditions for each corps would be more competitive resulting in more competitive corps. If there are no lower tier corps, it forces everyone who wants to march to funnel into the 7 remaining which would mean that the remaining corps would have the pick of the litter. It would result in more internal competition. Think about it this way, for every person who leaves troopers and goes to corps x, there are two others who have the performance ability to march where ever they want but stay at troopers. If the troopers are gone, that takes away two spots for the green kids who barely make corps x. Thus making those who make the corps have to work that much harder... follow? sorry it's late... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajawon Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 (edited) I've gone to a few camps at top tier corps and was given a contract just to prove that i could march wherever i wanted to but chose to stay with my drum corps family. I also have good friends who's marched in a top 5 world class corps before and chose to march their original corps, open class, the following year (aged-out there too). All in all i think it's more-so about the individual, people go where they think they'd be happier, whether that means leaving lower corps to go to a higher or the opposite (and rare scenario) of one leaving top corps to be with the lower, all about preference and motives. Edited August 31, 2008 by ajawon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluehull Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 Not really a topic that needs to be bandied around! Some of the lower placing corps are struggling to stay viable, quiet progress is part of the solution rather than what ifs.. Lots of personell engineering going on, but a public play by play is not what is needed now! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TerriTroop Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 well, yes that also makes sense... butI meant in the way that auditions for each corps would be more competitive resulting in more competitive corps. If there are no lower tier corps, it forces everyone who wants to march to funnel into the 7 remaining which would mean that the remaining corps would have the pick of the litter. It would result in more internal competition. Think about it this way, for every person who leaves troopers and goes to corps x, there are two others who have the performance ability to march where ever they want but stay at troopers. If the troopers are gone, that takes away two spots for the green kids who barely make corps x. Thus making those who make the corps have to work that much harder... follow? sorry it's late... No, I think your premise is wrong. For some people, having lower tier and OC corps around is a safety net. Without the safety net of other corps to audition for outside of top tier, many wouldn't bother auditioning at all. Thus, part of the talent base would be out of the audition mix. So the premise that ALL of the people currently marching OC or lower tier WC would have to funnel through the top tier is false. I think the top tier is plenty competitive already. I'm not even sure why you're floating the question other than some morbid curiosity to see how people would react to the premise of losing all drum corps outside of the top tier. (and let's stop talking about Troopers as if they are the feeder corps to the world, ok? Thanks.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vito Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 The flow of talent to the top corps is killing the activity. People complain that the same coprs win every year but for some reason can't see the cause. The older members want "just one year with a winner" and move on. I can't blame them. The are paying a lot for the experience and for the music majors it may make a differnce in their career options. The price of gas and air fair may begin to regionalize corps again. If this were to happen, smaller corps would have a better chance of developing and the "second tier" corps could challenge. This post started by asking about how goood would the top corps be without the second tier. Would we all suffer if the best corsp were only as good as the Blue Coats? That's a pretty good level for the product to be at. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gottalovit Posted August 31, 2008 Author Share Posted August 31, 2008 Sorry to all the Troopers people who are upset with me. I really hope that all the kids that have been with Troopers this season stay with Troopers. I have always said, I wish that more kids would stay with the corps they start with, and if that happened, I think all the corps would be closer to the same level, from top to bottom. If kids who marched with Pioneer stayed there, then the ability level would go up, and they could write more difficult shows and perform them even better. So anyone here march/work with Cavaliers, Cadets or Blue Devils in the last few years? Does anyone from here know how many members that marched that year came from other corps? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TerriTroop Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 Sorry to all the Troopers people who are upset with me. I really hope that all the kids that have been with Troopers this season stay with Troopers. I have always said, I wish that more kids would stay with the corps they start with, and if that happened, I think all the corps would be closer to the same level, from top to bottom. If kids who marched with Pioneer stayed there, then the ability level would go up, and they could write more difficult shows and perform them even better. So anyone here march/work with Cavaliers, Cadets or Blue Devils in the last few years? Does anyone from here know how many members that marched that year came from other corps? I hope you didn't think I was upset with you. I should have put a little after my parenthetical sentence. I was serious about my pragmatism. If the Troopers, or any other corps, doesn't manage to build up the desire to stay within its membership, members shouldn't stay out of guilt or pressure. Right now I hear lots of good hype from returning members and I think 2009 will be another great year for the corps. I'm not going to let a thread on DCP worry me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sday88 Posted September 1, 2008 Share Posted September 1, 2008 (edited) But out of those 700, there are likely enough who really can play/march/twirl to fill the few dozen openings in the corps. Even if 10% were worth your hill of beans, that's 70 kids. Wouldn't you think at least 10% are worth "a hill of beans"? Yes, I do. But whenever people spout off about corps having hundreds and hundreds of kids show up at auditions, indicating that there would then be hundreds and hundreds minus the ones who made at that particular corps, there may not really be that many left that are worth "a hill of beans". No need to get snippy with me. Edited September 1, 2008 by sday88 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
usmc5577 Posted September 2, 2008 Share Posted September 2, 2008 Actually, I would argue that the top corps would be even better if the other corps were not around. Consider that 20-30 years ago there were tons of corps competing for members. Prelims took 2 days just for open (world) class. Then you had the Class A corps and a lot of them. The point is that the more corps there are the thinner the talent pool. Ergo, the less corps there are the more competition there is to join each corps and therefore better the talent level for each corps. As far as experience goes I would say experience schmexperience. If a kid comes to a corps with no experience then they are a blank slate that can be easily trained with fewer things to unlearn from previous experience. Not a sermon, just a thought. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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