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You know drum corps is dying when.............


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You publish your repertoire and you play no RECOGNISABLE songs from it

I WANT JUST SONGS I KNOW AND AM COMFORTABLE WITH! I NEED TO BE IN MY COMFORT ZONE AT ALL TIMES!

The complaint, it appears, is that the repertoire lists tunes that are then unrecognizable when played. A tune is purported to be, say, from a song by Billy Joel, and the music played on the field is unrecognizable as such. Or arranged in such a disjointed fashion that listeners get annoyed trying to follow along. Or new music that would be warmly appreciated were it not also arranged in such fashion.

I know...it's so much easier to respond to a caricature of a person's position....

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It may be dying to you...but to this n00bie bando it has only begun to come alive.

To that group of preteens/early teen kids, standing on the platform, after the Atlanta show, waiting for the train, talking about how they can't wait to march for BD, Cavies, etc drum corps is not dying for them.

It might not be the drum corps of your past, but it is the drum corps of their future. Will their life lessons, learned at the hands of drum corps, be any less than yours because - they played a different keyed instrument, marched in a different style, or performed a show not to your liking?

Does that mean the old drums corps is any less relevant than the new style, NO - just means all things must evolve or they die.

I hope I can age in the Drum Corps world as I am attempting to in life - with grace.

It is ok to dislike a particular show, and that does not mean you have to dislike that corps or drum corps as a whole. (ie: I loved BD's 2009 show, but not their 2010 show. I loved Cavaliers 2010 show, but not their 2009 show.)

me likee!!!! Great Post. First time I've read one of yours but, you, in my opinion are spot on about this.

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Stop being a bunch of cry babies and rid yourself of drum corps then. If drum corps was the same as it was in the 60's and 70's, this same thread would come up because people would complain there's no growth and say it's dying because it's the same old. Either deal with the fact that Drum Corps has changed many times over the last 40 years or go away and leave us who enjoy the activity to enjoy it.

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You mention a couple of times that corps are playing obscure music. To that, I say...God forbid somebody hear something new that they might like. Y'know? I had never heard Emerson's Piano Concerto until Spirit played it...and now I like it! Go listen to Bizet's "Jeux d'enfants." Have you ever heard of it? I didn't even know it existed until yesterday, and now I love it. Look at that - I was exposed to something new and unfamiliar, and now I like it! Good for all those corps choosing to play music outside of the "norm."

I am grateful to have been exposed to a lot of new music through drumcorps.

That being said, there needs to be some sort of balance. This summer, I took two people to a show who had never seen drumcorps before. They were completely bored. They did not recognize one thing that any of the 11 corps at the show played. And it's not that they're musically illiterate either, because I was only familiar with a few myself. And then to end with BD whose show had no melody and came across as just a bunch of noise.... (sorry to beat that dead horse to a pulp - but that was our perception).

I was embarrased to have convinced them to go to the show. I feel like I wasted 4 hours of their life.

I don't have a problem with corps doing new stuff or experimenting with different material/concepts etc (like BD). But remember - you have to do something to connect with the audience. There wasn't much audience connecting going on this year in my opinion.

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I am grateful to have been exposed to a lot of new music through drumcorps.

That being said, there needs to be some sort of balance. This summer, I took two people to a show who had never seen drumcorps before. They were completely bored. They did not recognize one thing that any of the 11 corps at the show played. And it's not that they're musically illiterate either, because I was only familiar with a few myself. And then to end with BD whose show had no melody and came across as just a bunch of noise.... (sorry to beat that dead horse to a pulp - but that was our perception).

I was embarrased to have convinced them to go to the show. I feel like I wasted 4 hours of their life.

I don't have a problem with corps doing new stuff or experimenting with different material/concepts etc (like BD). But remember - you have to do something to connect with the audience. There wasn't much audience connecting going on this year in my opinion.

If they saw and didn't enjoy Crown, Bluecoats, Blue Stars, or Madison, they probably weren't going to enjoy a drum corps show anyway.

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Dateline 1890

Jezebel, verily, it's been a long time betwixt writings. Gramercy if prithee you betimes shrive me and vouchsafe me your rede, wherefore, forsooth, methinks I've been lamenting the current state of our welkin drum corps activity.

The arrangers have discovered this fain whipper-snapper sirrah named John Philip Sousa, whence his palter cacophony has durst become a fardel on moe fields of green like the flood waters upon Johnstown last year. The man is out to cozen and then cap-a-pie fordo drum corps. I have a friend who works for C.G. Conn who says they are working with JP on an instrument that could replace our beloved hélicons. And the folks at Conn are belike naming the inferno creature after Sousa himself. Sousa wants corps to march only at 120 beats-per-minute, the tempo of his inferno mote marches. Fie! My heart is pained by the thought we shall not return from the new bourn.

There is also a swain cornetist by the name of Herbert L. Clarke who is haply stirring things up with the most hideous of flamboyant cornet solos. I shudder the thought of such bruit joining those of Sousa's on the field. I fear we will soon no longer hear the likes of Stephen Foster's "Old Folks at Home." If it comes to the nonce anon when I can't be humming the opening line, "Way down upon the Swanee River" as I have become wont as I leave the stadium, fay, by the rood, I don't know what I'll do with my grief in the morrow. Withal, I suspect it means Morris Dances on the field shall avaunt. It makes me see incarnadine gules. Alack, I holp ere our orisons beseech the atomies lieges of drum corps so that thine take reck. Zounds!

Edited by Michael Boo
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Dateline 1890

Jezebel, verily, it's been a long time betwixt writings. Gramercy if prithee you betimes shrive me and vouchsafe me your rede, wherefore, forsooth, methinks I've been lamenting the current state of our welkin drum corps activity.

The arrangers have discovered this fain whipper-snapper sirrah named John Philip Sousa, whence his palter cacophony has durst become a fardel on moe fields of green like the flood waters upon Johnstown last year. The man is out to cozen and then cap-a-pie fordo drum corps. I have a friend who works for C.G. Conn who says they are working with JP on an instrument that could replace our beloved hélicons. And the folks at Conn are belike naming the inferno creature after Sousa himself. Sousa wants corps to march only at 120 beats-per-minute, the tempo of his inferno mote marches. Fie! My heart is pained by the thought we shall not return from the new bourn.

There is also a swain cornetist by the name of Herbert L. Clarke who is haply stirring things up with the most hideous of flamboyant cornet solos. I shudder the thought of such bruit joining those of Sousa's on the field. I fear we will soon no longer hear the likes of Stephen Foster's "Old Folks at Home." If it comes to the nonce anon when I can't be humming the opening line, "Way down upon the Swanee River" as I have become wont as I leave the stadium, fay, by the rood, I don't know what I'll do with my grief in the morrow. Withal, I suspect it means Morris Dances on the field shall avaunt. It makes me see incarnadine gules. Alack, I holp ere our orisons beseech the atomies lieges of drum corps so that thine take reck. Zounds!

hard to read - but epic

You always put a smile on my face Mr. Boo

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Dateline 1890

Jezebel, verily, it's been a long time betwixt writings. Gramercy if prithee you betimes shrive me and vouchsafe me your rede, wherefore, forsooth, methinks I've been lamenting the current state of our welkin drum corps activity.

The arrangers have discovered this fain whipper-snapper sirrah named John Philip Sousa, whence his palter cacophony has durst become a fardel on moe fields of green like the flood waters upon Johnstown last year. The man is out to cozen and then cap-a-pie fordo drum corps. I have a friend who works for C.G. Conn who says they are working with JP on an instrument that could replace our beloved hélicons. And the folks at Conn are belike naming the inferno creature after Sousa himself. Sousa wants corps to march only at 120 beats-per-minute, the tempo of his inferno mote marches. Fie! My heart is pained by the thought we shall not return from the new bourn.

There is also a swain cornetist by the name of Herbert L. Clarke who is haply stirring things up with the most hideous of flamboyant cornet solos. I shudder the thought of such bruit joining those of Sousa's on the field. I fear we will soon no longer hear the likes of Stephen Foster's "Old Folks at Home." If it comes to the nonce anon when I can't be humming the opening line, "Way down upon the Swanee River" as I have become wont as I leave the stadium, fay, by the rood, I don't know what I'll do with my grief in the morrow. Withal, I suspect it means Morris Dances on the field shall avaunt. It makes me see incarnadine gules. Alack, I holp ere our orisons beseech the atomies lieges of drum corps so that thine take reck. Zounds!

I thank ye.

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