Isn't It Time.....

[gsksun4]

Ed, I missed your original post. Everything OK?

[JimF-LowBari]

Ed, I missed your original post. Everything OK?

I screwed up my original reply.....

Hopefully fixed.... sorry Ed and gsk

[gsksun4]

I screwed up my original reply.....

Hopefully fixed.... sorry Ed and gsk

Jim, he edited his post and I missed what he said. He posted a reply with my post in it. Just wondering what I missed, that's all.

Glenn

Edited August 11, 2010 by gsksun4

[Tansea]

I love modern drum corps with all my heart and soul. I love the drum corps of my childhood-the 60's and before. I love the years I marched. The kids love that I am still involved and tell them about the old days without judging what they do. I love that rifles throw seven's, that corps march at 210 (try it some time), that the members not only can read but are usually music majors and can interpret what they play-well.

I don't want to go back to 126, starting on the sideline, going up and down the 50 and ending on the "exit" sideline. I don't find that stimulating. I kind of miss a good timpani line, but get off on watching a truly gifted timp play and pedal-well. I enjoy a good Broadway play and the music that goes along with it, but I don't want to hear a World corps play one. I'll borrow a staff pass to listen to a DCA Alumni corps do it though. I enjoy using as much of the brain I have left, yes, the 70's, appreciating an abstract concept presented on the field to an arrangement perhaps the average person can't whistle leaving the stadium-I usually can.

However, if you wish to sit on the metaphorical bar stool that is this part of the forum and wax nostalgic about the old days and how much better it was, then have at it Hoss. I'll even buy the next round. I mean I miss a big rotating wheel to the strains of, "Danny Boy", more than I can express here in the written word.

[Fran Haring]

....to get along with the younger DC kids and accept what they do as the same as we did?

You mean as opposed to careening through a parking lot after a show in our car and knocking down members of current DCI corps while cursing their ancestries?

:worthy:

I am, of course, just kidding with the above statement.

I absolutely accept what the current marching members do. Their work ethic, their dedication, their love for the activity... all of those things are cornerstones of the drum corps experience... in the past, currently, and (hopefully) long into the future.

I don't necessarily like all the modern-day shows I see (I enjoy/have enjoyed a bunch of 'em for various reasons, but some... well.... I just don't get)...... but the corps members? Hats off to them for all their efforts.

[ereese]

Ed, I missed your original post. Everything OK?

Everything is fine. In my original post I went off on one of my dilatory Philippics (emotional speech that goes no where). In essence I said, those of us who have been around that activity view the newer kids coming in with our existing paradigm. That being, we cut our teeth on old time corps. Listened to the Stetson Richmond records (not tapes, CDs) as well as the stories of those who came before us, and were awed by the history of it all, the tradition. What I'm seeing, from looking at many of the profiles of posters here on DCP is. Those who take a strident position on today's corps, and make disparaging remarks about old corps, is that they are too young to have a reference point as to our position. They never saw, live, the '74 Anaheim Kingsmen, or SCV in '74,'75, heck not even '89. Much less Star. No 27th, Madison when they would peel your face off. Not to mention Cabs BITD, Sky in their Heyday, Baltimore doing Requiem, Sun with the Procession of the Nobles, you know what I'm talking about. That electifying, viseral, pit-of-the-gut and soul feeling that you experienced. It's like trying to explain what a hot fudge sundae on vanilla ice cream tastes like to someone who has never tasted chocolate, or ice cream or cherries and whipped cream. They have yogurt, and yogurt is good. It's healthy, complex, sophisticated, yummy. They are both desserts, but it is not a hot fudge sundae. To make my point, how many DCI corps jackets do you see at any DCA show? Including the championships.

So basically, I'm not sure there is a middle ground. I've accepted modern drum corps for what it is, and I've stopped trying to make my point regarding old vs. new, to those who can't, and from my experience, unwilling to relate.

However, I still prefer a hot fudge sundae

Edited August 11, 2010 by ereese

[gsksun4]

Everything is fine. In my original post I went off on one of my dilatory Philippics (emotional speech that goes no where). In essence I said, those of us who have been around that activity view the newer kids coming in with our existing paradigm. That being, we cut our teeth on old time corps. Listened to the Stetson Richmond records (not tapes, CDs) as well as the stories of those who came before us, and were awed by the history of it all, the tradition. What I'm seeing, from looking at many of the profiles of posters here on DCP is. Those who take a strident position on today's corps, and make disparaging remarks about old corps, is that they are too young to have a reference point as to our position. They never saw, live, the '74 Anaheim Kingsmen, or SCV in '74,'75, heck not even '89. Much less Star. No 27th, Madison when they would peel your face off. Not to mention Cabs BITD, Sky in their Heyday, Baltimore doing Requiem, Sun with the Procession of the Nobles, you know what I'm talking about. That electifying, viseral, pit-of-the-gut and soul feeling that you experienced. It's like trying to explain what a hot fudge sundae on vanilla ice cream tastes like to someone who has never tasted chocolate, or ice cream or cherries and whipped cream. They have yogurt, and yogurt is good. It's healthy, complex, sophisticated, yummy. They are both desserts, but it is not a hot fudge sundae. To make my point, how many DCI corps jackets do you see at any DCA show? Including the championships.

So basically, I'm not sure there is a middle ground. I've accepted modern drum corps for what it is, and I've stopped trying to make my point regarding old vs. new, to those who can't, and from my experience, unwilling to relate.

However, I still prefer a hot fudge sundae

Very well put ED. I agree. One thing I'll never forget and this goes back to around 1961, is seeing the buses pull into the parking lot, the lighting ladders going up as they drove those stakes into the ground and attached the ropes to steady the lights, the crowd filling the stands, packing the entire house. The sun going down as they threw the switch to light up that field. Drums and bugles warming up in the distance and the first corps marching to the starting line under the lights. Then the salute and wham! It was never any better than that. I think my first corps to view was the Dumont Police Cadets. Wow, so big and the sound was incredible. Up till that point, I had no idea what an M&M contest was. I was in a small parade corps, and doing standstills on Saturday afternoons. The rest is history.

Let those who never experienced that think as they may. They have their own wow moments I'm sure. And while it is sad many will never share them, I know in my heart they can never take my experience away from me.

[KeithHall]

Amazing post!!!! I too prefer a hot fudge sundae although my doctors probably would not appreciate hearing me say that. LOL

Everything is fine. In my original post I went off on one of my dilatory Philippics (emotional speech that goes no where). In essence I said, those of us who have been around that activity view the newer kids coming in with our existing paradigm. That being, we cut our teeth on old time corps. Listened to the Stetson Richmond records (not tapes, CDs) as well as the stories of those who came before us, and were awed by the history of it all, the tradition. What I'm seeing, from looking at many of the profiles of posters here on DCP is. Those who take a strident position on today's corps, and make disparaging remarks about old corps, is that they are too young to have a reference point as to our position. They never saw, live, the '74 Anaheim Kingsmen, or SCV in '74,'75, heck not even '89. Much less Star. No 27th, Madison when they would peel your face off. Not to mention Cabs BITD, Sky in their Heyday, Baltimore doing Requiem, Sun with the Procession of the Nobles, you know what I'm talking about. That electifying, viseral, pit-of-the-gut and soul feeling that you experienced. It's like trying to explain what a hot fudge sundae on vanilla ice cream tastes like to someone who has never tasted chocolate, or ice cream or cherries and whipped cream. They have yogurt, and yogurt is good. It's healthy, complex, sophisticated, yummy. They are both desserts, but it is not a hot fudge sundae. To make my point, how many DCI corps jackets do you see at any DCA show? Including the championships.

So basically, I'm not sure there is a middle ground. I've accepted modern drum corps for what it is, and I've stopped trying to make my point regarding old vs. new, to those who can't, and from my experience, unwilling to relate.

However, I still prefer a hot fudge sundae

[k357]

Yep the hot fudge sundae gets my vote too.... That's a fantstic comparison....

[jojo]

Marching all-age for awhile has effectively given me back DCI. Working really hard to do it the "new" way made me love it all again after hating it for a very long time. Post senior corps I find that I love watching the "kids" again but I can't help but feel a little sorry for them too. I'm pretty convinced that we got the better end of the deal in a lot of ways, dinosaur or not. After all, they'll never know what it is to be 15 and waving goodbye to their parents from a bus window for a whole 4 weeks and feeling like the world is theirs to conquer. Oh the freedom! Or to pull 3 buses into the middle of small midwestern town to find the whole place in the throes of "Italian Day" or "Polka Day" (or whatever) and take the town hostage in the space of a 2-hour dinner break. They'll never have the fun of living on a bus for weeks at a time with pillow cases on their seat backs and styrofoam coolers jammed under their feet and every night a slumber party with 128 of their closest friends. Or know the sheer joy of it finally being their turn to stretch out in the aisle of the bus after 10 hours scrunched in a seat. Or get dressed in their uniform on some shocked family's front lawn, lol. Or develop the dexterity to walk on armrests all the way from the back to the front of the bus. Or have their sandwich handled by no less than 25 people before it ever reaches them in the back of the bus. Or know the real fun that can be found in a midwestern town on a laundry day. Or get left behind by the bus in Davenport Iowa and get to meet the nice police officers there. Or see the world's largest ball of string as an "educational" part of their journey across country. Or witness that the center of the US is comprised entirely of rows of corn, lol. Seriously I think they miss out on a lot of the "experience" with food trucks and chaperones (yes, I said chaperones), flights and hotels and being comprised of "kids" from "all over the country" instead of their own neighborhoods.

I wouldn't trade being a dinosaur for anything

Edited August 17, 2010 by jojo