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Why is Change a so bad?


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Ive read so many debates on change on DCP. All the arguments from older fans, newer fans and everthing in between. Why is change considered so bad? The biggest argument I hear is " WELL IT"S NOT DRUM CORPS" SO then I ask " WELL DIDN"T DRUM CORPS CHANGE FROM THE 40s to the 50s to the 60's so on and so on? Then I get the answer " WELL IT DIDN"T CHANGE IT"S FORMAT OR WHAT IT BASICALLY IS" . Now depending who you talk to even letting females in an all male corps was travesty back then and people left their corps and vowed never to return. Same happened with theme and theatrics. Is what makes it drum corps just brass? hmmmmmm if people say yes I just ask why?

I think sometimes change just leaves some people behind and that can be scary if what you know is suddenly obsolete. Just a thought. :rolleyes:

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Ive read so many debates on change on DCP. All the arguments from older fans, newer fans and everthing in between. Why is change considered so bad? The biggest argument I hear is " WELL IT"S NOT DRUM CORPS" SO then I ask " WELL DIDN"T DRUM CORPS CHANGE FROM THE 40s to the 50s to the 60's so on and so on? Then I get the answer " WELL IT DIDN"T CHANGE IT"S FORMAT OR WHAT IT BASICALLY IS" . Now depending who you talk to even letting females in an all male corps was travesty back then and people left their corps and vowed never to return. Same happened with theme and theatrics. Is what makes it drum corps just brass? hmmmmmm if people say yes I just ask why?

I think sometimes change just leaves some people behind and that can be scary if what you know is suddenly obsolete. Just a thought. :rolleyes:

My only rebuttal (mostly because my arthritis is acting up and I don't want to get into it) is: Why is change so good?

Typically, youth embraces all change whereas elderly folks are much more cautious of it. You see, when you get older, you see the consequences of some change. Too often there is a headlong rush into change for the sake of change and people have not taken the time to discern the outcome.

One can make up their own mind whether or not drum corps is changing for the better or the worse, but let me assure you that the change happening today is a result of changes that happened years ago. Now...if drum corps fell of the face of the earth, most all of us would go on in life without too much trouble. So...I think the better approach to these discussions would be to temper our enthusiasm with the understanding that there are more important things in life.

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"Why is change considered so bad?"

Well let me take a whack at this (all IMO, FWIW, etc, etc :rolleyes: )....

As background: Started in 1974 and have seen DC go from piston/rotor, no pits, all G, symmetric drills (mostly), no themes, easily identified corps identities, etc, etc. Also have collection of audio going back to 1950 so able to track how the sound of DC changed over the past 60 years. And in my first year heard the "that ain't drum corps" in reference to appearance of marching bells. Some changes over the years didn't bother me at all and some have left me cold enough that I don't attend WC anymore. (Not angry over the changes, just not entertaining to me.)

When I see a change in DC (or anything else for that matter) I want to know the reason why. Three changes I really hated were going to upright valves, front pits and Bb. Didn't like them but could understand the reasoning behind each of them (grumble, grumble... alright then..). But the amps and electronic additions I have yet to see a really good reason (good enough for me anyway) given. Most reasons given were ye olde catchall of "increasing creativity" and "opening up DC to new members". Those "reasons" are strange to me since (1) does that mean we didn't have any creativity before Amps/electronics and (2) had non-brass/percussion people join before.

As I posted yesterday and at other times what I see is DCI hitting the panic button as far as recruitment is concerned. Economy is bad, costs are up and some corps are not able to fill all their spots. So opening up to non-brass/percussion allows more (dues paying) potential members. If that is part of the reasoning behind the latest changes then they should be said out loud.

As for "that ain't Drum Corps: IMO, Drum Corps was the sound of percussion and brass only. From the start ca 1919 until a few years ago, DC retained that distinction. Instruments changed, shows changed, styles changed, etc, etc but it was still the sound of those two families of instruments. Limited perhaps but very distinctive, just like bagpipe bands or fife & drum. With the changes over the last few years, DCI has lost that distinction.

Edited by JimF-LowBari
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Change is not necessarily bad.

As I have said repeatedly here, it's when change for change's sake happens and it turns off the audience.

The evolution of the instruments used over decades- until the advent of amplification- has been decidedly positive for instance.

The evolution of the Color Guard and over all visual vocabulary has been positive.

There are just some things that, just perhaps, I'll readily support with bands doing it, but not for a Corps to do. The mediums are similar, but also different in certain essential ways, and there's been a very deliberate attempt from some circles to blur the distinctions more and more for what my guess is to promote certain agendas.

Well thought-out change is positive. Many of us simply think some of what's been done lately hasn't been particularly well thought-out, more an attempt to "Change" because of the mantra that "All change is good". Not to get real political- but I think a lot of us are learning that "Change" hasn't done a lot of good over the last year and a half for a lot of people....

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the changes pre 2003 were all brass percussion, color guard and drill.

every major change since then has altered that.

if you stick to the basics, it's fine. when fundamentally change that, it doesn't have appeal.

if you look at pro sports, while they make changes and tweaks, they keep the fundamentals.

and when you try and sell your change as to want to become something that isn't viewed as highly as drum corps is, it turns people off.

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Ive read so many debates on change on DCP. All the arguments from older fans, newer fans and everthing in between. Why is change considered so bad? The biggest argument I hear is " WELL IT"S NOT DRUM CORPS" SO then I ask " WELL DIDN"T DRUM CORPS CHANGE FROM THE 40s to the 50s to the 60's so on and so on? Then I get the answer " WELL IT DIDN"T CHANGE IT"S FORMAT OR WHAT IT BASICALLY IS" . Now depending who you talk to even letting females in an all male corps was travesty back then and people left their corps and vowed never to return. Same happened with theme and theatrics. Is what makes it drum corps just brass? hmmmmmm if people say yes I just ask why?

I think sometimes change just leaves some people behind and that can be scary if what you know is suddenly obsolete. Just a thought. :rolleyes:

I think you hit the nail on the hit. When we become fans of things (sports, movie directors, technology, TV shows, etc) we become complacent and happy with what we have grown accustomed to. For example, when I was in high school and Green Day was relatively 'new' to the national music scene, I LOVED the simplicity of their song writing: the songs were simple musical structure-wise, and the lyrics were simple (almost cliched), dealing with teenage angst and lost-love. When Green Day made the "switch" to the 'punk opera' stuff w/American Idiot and their most recent 21st Century Breakdown, I at first scoffed at what I perceived to be a heavy-handed pretension to the songs. I wrote it off and stopped listening to their new stuff: choosing instead to focus on the old stuff that I was "comfortable" with and I had liked since the early 90's. But I kind of got over that around the time 21st Century Break Down came out, when I heard them play SNL and REALLY got into a song (21 Guns). I revisited their 'punk opera' material with a more open mind, convinced myself that the band has obviously 'grown up' and matured, changed their interests a bit which changed their writing style, and just took the music at face value for what it was: slightly intricate pop-punk with decent lyrics, great hooks, and innovative for their genre of music. I've really gotten into those two albums and have developed a nice balance between their older stuff and their current stuff. I've let go of my bias and sentimentality of their older stuff (though when I listen to, say, Kerplunk or their earlier EP's like 1000 Hours I still get a smile and remember the good ol' days) and appreciate their current stuff. In fact, I appreciate their new stuff even more knowing where they've come from and how they've changed.

Honestly, the same happened with drum corps. I grew up as a drum corps fan in the late 80's-mid 90's, and TOTALLY cherish shows from, say, 1987-1996 (as well as earlier 80's stuff). I marched in 1997 and 1998 and then the more 'radical' changes of my existence started happening: first there was any-key brass. That REALLY annoyed me (even though I'm a percussionist), and when I moved cross-country summer of 1999 I missed most shows and stopped caring a lot about the activity. When things changed more and more in the early/mid-00's, I stopped following drum corps. Then my job changed from teaching middle school to high school, and I started following drum corps merely as a way of seeing what the current trends are. I started noticing the amount of demand being executed pretty well, and the incredible quality of sound that the average horn line has now vs. when I marched. I realized that I could indeed embrace and appreciate what I like about drum corps, and set aside my differences and "reconcile" what I don't like. I realized that 'my time,' my era of drum corps is long passed, and I owed it to the current generation/era of corps to at least give it a chance.

Once I did that, essential got over the biases and beliefs of my era of marching, I was able to appreciate the activity and what the current crop of members and designers have to offer. There is still plenty I don't like as far as show designs (that was always the case, to be honest), but there is even more to appreciate and like (and sometimes downright love). For me it was easy and just not focusing on things that bug me, and instead focus on things I like. I can usually do that with everyone, though there are some shows that don't do much for me at all (when I watch them on the live feeds they're typically my 'get up and stretch, talk with friends, etc' and the shows are merely background white noise): again, that's really no different that the 80's or 90's. I also realized that drum corps is constantly evolving. What I considered the 'golden era' of drum corps, generations before me despised for its deviation from what they considered 'real' drum corps. What someone who ages out in 2005 considers 'real drum corps' is going to be drastically different from what the activity looks like in 2018, I imagine. The activity changes regardless, and we can either stick around and find things to like, or go away and find other hobbies.

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Change is necessary.

Keeping the fundamentals is more necessary.

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The activity changes regardless, and we can either stick around and find things to like, or go away and find other hobbies.

Exactly. It's just that I'm getting too old to find another hobby. I've already invested so much in this one.

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that gets harder to every year.

and not the support hose part

So then pull up your support stockings and enjoy however it its presented hehehe
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