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Another open letter to DCI.


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There's rule one of "ignorant, stupid or evil" again - "if they don't agree with me, they must be ignorant"....

Rules one and two fall under the "hubris" category.

See - it works quite well for all circumstances, both sides of the fence.

No, that is not what I am saying at all. Any person can like whatever they like. You (the royal you) don't have to agree with me or anyone else. Doesn't make you uneducated for disagreeing about this or that show. What I do feel is an uneducated opinion is to attend a 2012 show and then complain that it is not like it was in 1972.

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Also, look at the new sheets on the DCI website. "innovation" figures prominently on the GE sheets, I also believe it is also to be seriously considered on every other World Class sheet. Who was the most 'innovative' this year? Only one real answer to that, whether anyone likes that answer or not.

The judges doing what they are asked to do as best they can do it by the DCI members. BD read the sheets a bit more thoroughly and exploited the bejesus out of the innovative angle, whether anyone likes the outcome or not.

With a theme from 2008, music from 1991 and 1996, and the same snippet music and scatter drill tactics they relied upon in their past four seasons? How is that innovative? Their own feeder corps had a more innovative show.

Mind you, I would rather not have innovation called out on the judging sheets. First problem is that it would tend to force corps into doing bizarre things just to satisfy the requirement to innovate. Second problem is the inevitable arguments regarding what is/is not innovative. Watch the responses to my post to see what I mean. Or consider some other examples. Did Crown innovate by having full sections of brass double-tongue while marching, or is that just tried and true times two? Was Madison's medleying of Pictures at an Exhibition with so many other themes innovative, or is anything that contains a hint of Malaguena automatically passe? Was Surf's use of a contemporary song innovative, or was it indistinguishable from the halftime entertainment another poster referred to here?

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Yes, scatter drill is very easy to clean.

But I agree based upon what the judges want these days, BD did the best job of delivering that.

It is not "what the judges want"...it is "what criteria the corps want the judges to use" in coming up with their ranking and rating.

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No, that is not what I am saying at all. Any person can like whatever they like. You (the royal you) don't have to agree with me or anyone else. Doesn't make you uneducated for disagreeing about this or that show. What I do feel is an uneducated opinion is to attend a 2012 show and then complain that it is not like it was in 1972.

Not uneducated Mike, just different from the way you see it.

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Not uneducated Mike, just different from the way you see it.

We'll just to agree to disagree on that one. I have no problem with a person preferring 1972 drum corps to 2012 drum corps. Doesn't mean they have an uneducated opinion on what they like. What I do find is an "uneducated opinion" is to expect that 2012 drum corps should be like 1972 drum corps.

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We'll just to agree to disagree on that one. I have no problem with a person preferring 1972 drum corps to 2012 drum corps. Doesn't mean they have an uneducated opinion on what they like. What I do find is an "uneducated opinion" is to expect that 2012 drum corps should be like 1972 drum corps.

No - that's not uneducated opinion. It's perhaps an unrealistic hope that gets dashed on seeing a modern show for the first time. The opinion is what is formed on seeing the new show. "Uneducated" is not a word that applies in any context here, other than to denigrate the person who sees it differently from you. Rule # 1 - "ignorant".

Rather like a modern MM who watches a show from the 70's expecting it to be like the show they marched last week.

Edited by Grandpa
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it's a shame you are going to stop watching drum corps at the DCI level, because personally I think you are giving up a very entertaining activity. Do I love every show I see each year? no, but I enjoy most of them and love a few. If I decided I hated 1 show so strongly that I would stop watching all the others because of 1 show I didn't enjoy it would seem like I was throwing the baby out with the bath water so to speak.

But it is your decision, so I'm sorry to see a fellow drum corps fan giving up on our wonderful activity but enjoy the rest of your life.

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Yes, scatter drill is very easy to clean.

then why wasn't all of Crown's running/scatter drill clean? they ran around more in their show than BD did, but they didn't do it as cleanly

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then why wasn't all of Crown's running/scatter drill clean? they ran around more in their show than BD did, but they didn't do it as cleanly

No idea, but that's why I also said that BD did the best job of it. For the record I didn't really care for Crown's show either. So don't try and put me in the boo hoo Crown didn't win category, because I could care less about them.

And also for the record I thought most of BD's shows in the 90's were absolutely amazing. So it's not the corps I dislike it's the direction their programs are currently going. Now, I'm not going to encourage my kids to march their, but if they told me that's what they wanted then I would support it.

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With a theme from 2008, music from 1991 and 1996, and the same snippet music and scatter drill tactics they relied upon in their past four seasons? How is that innovative? Their own feeder corps had a more innovative show.

Mind you, I would rather not have innovation called out on the judging sheets. First problem is that it would tend to force corps into doing bizarre things just to satisfy the requirement to innovate. Second problem is the inevitable arguments regarding what is/is not innovative. Watch the responses to my post to see what I mean. Or consider some other examples. Did Crown innovate by having full sections of brass double-tongue while marching, or is that just tried and true times two? Was Madison's medleying of Pictures at an Exhibition with so many other themes innovative, or is anything that contains a hint of Malaguena automatically passe? Was Surf's use of a contemporary song innovative, or was it indistinguishable from the halftime entertainment another poster referred to here?

Weaving pieces together has been done before in arrangements. There's a top level HS band in the Harrisburg, PA area that's done that for at least a decade. Granted, Smith's book was utterly brilliant. But the concept's been done before.

The Theatre of the Absurd is quite different from Dada. Maybe not obvious, but it is. And they arguably never reached an absurd level in 2008. They ostensibly 'risked' it, and were flat and boring as heck. This time, they embraced the philosophy whoe hof, and a rather controverisl and dangerous philosophy at that. The show was well performed but not as interesting or as obvius as to what they were getting at. It also happened to have faced the Phantom Regiment buzzsaw that deserved to beat it. Crown's show wasn't as inspiring, dramatic or as exciting by far as Spartacus. Great horn line at Crown, yeah- but I'll take Spartacus, gladiatir fights, legionairres, and the dead conductor over Crown-Man and Carolina-Girl any day. And unusually, I'll take Dada over them, too. Seen HS Band color guards dressed up as superheroes. Never seen one attempt Dadaist performance art... :tongue:

Doing contemporary/pop music? Hmm. College bands have done that for decades, playing pop tunes appropo to the times. Sorry. I know it's bubble bursting, but maybe I'm a bit jaded. The freshest show out there was BD. Yes, they used Bird and Bela and B-Flat again, but And maybe some people noticed they may have played it better than the 92 corps....in that context- it worked.

Part of Dadaism is to generate controversy, reactions of all types. This show has certainly done just that, hasn't it!? :satisfied:

Did Crown leaving me feel more 'commony goodness' inside me? They left me gobstopped by an awesome horn line that I believe has put to bed the notion G horlines are better and more powerful, yes. But did they really, really communicate their theme, aesthetic, and message as well? No.

Oh, and the Cascades stuck a couple os sets of tympani across the field from one another a few years ago. They had to ditch it by championships weekend because they'd been dreadfully phasing all show and they were a visual distraction and annoyance in yjeir case. So that wasn't new, either. It's just Crown got it to work, to their credit.

The crux of the issue is this: It seems people think innovation is the use of electronic sound envelopes and using some new percussion on the sideline that looks like a tuned mushroom farm, and that might get the judge to check of on 'innovative' on their sheet. Someone took a real risk, really innovated- and managed to pull it off. THat show had a high chance of exploding in their faces, they got the thing to actually work, whether anyone liked it or not. :satisfied:

Edited by BigW
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