Hindsight

[Just A Plain Old Fan]

Alright, then. But what business do you know of that is based on an unsustainably travel-intensive touring model, where obtaining a voice in the running of said business is contingent upon mandatory annual participation in that tour?

Audiodb,

I think craiga was just saying that we might look through glasses that are a bit too rose-colored sometimes when lamenting the loss of ### corps. Based on your rebuttal(s), I'd bet you two pretty much agree that the fault is somewhere in the middle.

One thing though; Jersey Surf, Academy, and a handful of the CA World Class corps do not participate in the full tour and they have an equal voice to any corps in the top 12, according to the current DCI by-laws. If you were referencing the past DCI structure, then you are correct.

[audiodb]

I think craiga was just saying that we might look through glasses that are a bit too rose-colored sometimes when lamenting the loss of ### corps. Based on your rebuttal(s), I'd bet you two pretty much agree that the fault is somewhere in the middle.

Most likely, yes.

One thing though; Jersey Surf, Academy, and a handful of the CA World Class corps do not participate in the full tour and they have an equal voice to any corps in the top 12, according to the current DCI by-laws. If you were referencing the past DCI structure, then you are correct.

As you suspected, I was speaking in historical terms.

By the way, Jersey Surf is probably the only one of the aforementioned that has ever had full voting rights as a limited-tour corps. Not sure, but I believe Pacific Crest and Academy went full-tour before they each obtained full voting rights, due to the old policy that required three straight years of top-21 for full membership. (Mandarins have met the DCI "full tour" definition every year of their world-class participation.)

[Shadow_7]

We need to stop looking back 30 years through rose colored glasses. Today's drum corps provide an excellent experience for their members, who are well fed, well housed, transported on safe buses, and taught by professional, educated people. The activity will continue to evolve...and thank god!

Are we talking about the same activity? From what I've heard housing has been one of the biggest issues of late. With year round school and such in many parts. It's not uncommon to have several corps at one school and we're not talking IU with 8 practicefields and an indoor track / fieldhouse. Sometimes they even end up at a local YMCA's and other off the wall places. Not to say that they're not well fed, but some corps with the higher fuel costs, even though they have a mobile Kitchen will leave said vehicle at home come tour time. So just how well fed can they be when the Kitchen is effectively run out of a bus bay? I'm sure they do the best with what they have. But compared to how things used to be, it's not all better now than then.

[craiga]

If any corps with 100-150 members is feeding kids out of a bus bay, that is completely unacceptable. In fact, I cannot believe it. How can their facilities pass health and food inspections? It's not possible.

[Piper]

If any corps with 100-150 members is feeding kids out of a bus bay, that is completely unacceptable. In fact, I cannot believe it. How can their facilities pass health and food inspections? It's not possible.

I don't think that health and food inspectors are in the habit of following corps around on tour. They have too many cockroach infested resturaunts and hot dog processing facilities to worry about.

[craiga]

You may be right, but I do know that Boston's food trailer gets inspected every year at move in by the State of New Hampshire. It is an un-announced Class A Restaurant Health and Food Safety inspection. (They always pass, btw ) I assumed that all corps had to meet the same standard. Can't imagine how a bus bay would pass, when BAC gets tested on how cold the walk-in is and how sanitary the grills and sinks are......just sayin'.

[glory]

Are we talking about the same activity? From what I've heard housing has been one of the biggest issues of late. With year round school and such in many parts. It's not uncommon to have several corps at one school and we're not talking IU with 8 practicefields and an indoor track / fieldhouse. Sometimes they even end up at a local YMCA's and other off the wall places. Not to say that they're not well fed, but some corps with the higher fuel costs, even though they have a mobile Kitchen will leave said vehicle at home come tour time. So just how well fed can they be when the Kitchen is effectively run out of a bus bay? I'm sure they do the best with what they have. But compared to how things used to be, it's not all better now than then.

I think you are referring to the exceptions. Few would seriously challenge the assertions that conditions on the road generally have improved over the past few decades because they have. The corps operating today generally are better prepared to serve and protect the kids in their care.

HH

[BRASSO]

Here's my theory: casinos killed local bingo; loss of bingo revenue killed local drum corps. How's that sound?

Pretty simplistic in my view. No one thing " killed local Drum Corps ". It was a combination of a lot of things.

This would be akin to saying that the unionization of General Motors created the ultimate collapse of the city of Detroit, and the rise of Beijing as the auto capitol of the world.

Edited January 11, 2010 by BRASSO

[BRASSO]

I think that the only way to have helped most of the corps who folded is for a LOT of people who won the lottery to give generously. From what I know from "insiders," the majority of the corps that folded did so because of financial reasons. If we're really being honest, back in the olden days drum corps was run mostly with good intentions, and not enough business sense. People who run corps do so because they have a VERY strong passion. Now-a-days a lot of corps directors have business training, where as I think a lot of corps in the 60's, 70's, 80's, and even in the 90's were run by guys who wanted to provide a great performance experience for young people. I know of directors who personally paid for essential things for a corps just to keep them on the road (for example, a corps is not selling enough souvies and in order to fill up the fleet, or feed the members, the corps director would pay out of pocket to keep things going). As that is no way for a healthy organization to be run, when directors and staff can no longer afford to pay for the corps the corps has no choice but to fold due to no money. Now, I think many current directors no only have the love of the activity, the drive to bring a great performance/education opportunity to you people, AND business training.

Of course, sometimes corps have financial issues even when their directors has a business degree. There are TONS of alternatives to drum corps that cost a lot less for young people, and recruiting seems to be difficult for all but the most competitively successful corps. We can blame show design evolution, national touring model, out-of-town recruitment instead of local recruitment, etc, but the heart of this is corps that folded generally spent above their means and when they were too far in debt there was no choice but to fold.

I agree that we're well passed lamenting the loss of our favorite corps (for what it's worth, the corps that I marched with folded in the mid-00's), and should instead focus on keeping the corps on the field in healthy business shape. Donate and volunteer when possible: it's something fairly easy that most of us can do.

True, but then the current " smart people" put DCI Championships in places like Jackson,Mississippi and at Lucas Stadium, etc and all that theory of DCI being run by savvy marketing people with this supposed great "business training " seems to go out the window, no ?

Edited January 11, 2010 by BRASSO

[MikeD]

Perhaps if the leadership of the drum corps activity had looked at the issues you bring up (like increasing transportation costs and decreasing pool of adult volunteers), and developed strategies to confront those issues (like focusing on operating models that are less travel-intensive and less demanding for volunteers), we'd have kept more corps around.

Except that most of the corps that failed over time were not touring corps, they were local corps.