actucker Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 You have the last sentence correct. The preceding 1.5 sentences, though, are about 15 years too late. I think the "drum corps was more appealing to the general populous back in such and such a year" is a deluded argument. More people were involved because there were more corps. For better or for worse, that community role that the drum corps of old filled has been replaced by competitive high school marching band. I would wager, if you consider marching arts as a whole, there is in fact MORE involvement per capita now than there was 30 years ago. Drum corps itself has simply evolved beyond that general community based role into the "next level" for those community based performers in their high school marching bands to strive for. There's nothing wrong with that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
actucker Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 But I don't think that her reaction would have been the same 20 years ago. I'm not saying it's good or bad, only that it is worth considering. Most highly successful spectator sports make changes only with great care. Rule changes are mostly fine-tuning, rather than wholesale change, because change means risk. If you go to watch a baseball game, or a ballet, you go with certain basic expectations in mind. I don't know for certain, but I would expect that most casual attendees of drumcorps go expecting to see something that primarily features marching, military precision, powerful brass, flashy drumming, colorful pageantry, rifle work, and exhilirating music. I think that by supplanting more and more of that with electronics, other instrumentation, modern dance, special effects, etc., that it is gradually losing what makes it unique, and that the ultimate consequence of that will be that one day it will no longer have a reason to exist. I could be wrong, but that is not an uncommon order of the rise and fall of other activities. I think the "casual fan" is just as capable of evolving as the activity is, if not more so. I've seen it myself. Sure, some are going to be turned off by drum corps evolution, but just as many if not more would be turned off by watching the same exact shows year in and year out. I don't think drum corps is in any danger of "losing what makes it unique". Tell me, exactly when have you seen anything like what the Blue Devils put on the field this past summer? What about Carolina Crown? I'd say both of those shows were pretty unique. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
audiodb Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 I think the "drum corps was more appealing to the general populous back in such and such a year" is a deluded argument. More people were involved because there were more corps. And why were there more corps? Evidently, the activity held a certain appeal to both participants and spectators back in the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
audiodb Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 I think the "casual fan" is just as capable of evolving as the activity is, if not more so. I've seen it myself. But you offered this in response to a post about first-time viewers. They haven't been following along and "evolving". They are forming their first (and perhaps last) impressions based on the comtemporary activity. I don't think drum corps is in any danger of "losing what makes it unique". Well, that is even more paradoxical, considering it was you who just said this: For better or for worse, that community role that the drum corps of old filled has been replaced by competitive high school marching band. If marching band can serve as a replacement for drum corps at the local level, then drum corps isn't as unique as you claim, now, is it? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 (edited) I think the "drum corps was more appealing to the general populous back in such and such a year" is a deluded argument. More people were involved because there were more corps. Care to say why you believe that? My experience is from working local shows mid 70s-mid 80s in Central PA area. There was a higher percentage of people not connected to a corps in any way attending than there are today. If you think it was corps playing to mostly other corps people you are sadly mistaken, That goes for both field shows and standstills. Probably answers why the crowds were larger too in places like Hershey, Carlisle and Mount Carmel (where?). My WTF moment is seeing the 7000 attendance given for a 5 Sr corps show in Mahanoy(sp) City, PA from the early 60s. Sure as Hades not 7K musicians or corps people in PA hard coal country. Edited December 9, 2012 by JimF-LowBari Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 I think the "casual fan" is just as capable of evolving as the activity is, if not more so. I've seen it myself. Sure, some are going to be turned off by drum corps evolution, but just as many if not more would be turned off by watching the same exact shows year in and year out. I don't think drum corps is in any danger of "losing what makes it unique". Tell me, exactly when have you seen anything like what the Blue Devils put on the field this past summer? What about Carolina Crown? I'd say both of those shows were pretty unique. And how is a new person going to be able to evolve or tell the differences if you can't get them to go to another show. What's the old business saying "Getting them in the door is easy. Getting them to come back is the hard part". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
actucker Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 (edited) And why were there more corps? :doh:/>/> Evidently, the activity held a certain appeal to both participants and spectators back in the day. The same reason there are more kids in marching band in high school now. Its an after school activity. The fact that it happens to be tied to a school and drum corps wasn't has very little to do with that fact. Drum corps wasn't replaced in artistic nature by marching band. It was replaced in functionality. 40 years ago, local drum corps was more about community kids having something to do. Now, there are a thousand of outreach programs with the exact same priorities. High school marching band happens to be one of them. That doesn't stop drum corps from being different from marching band. How many new people do you really expect to draw from the general populace? Most of the new audiences get brought in either through having been involved in music already in some way, or having been brought to a show by someone who is already either a fan, or involved somehow. Every marching band kid in the high school band I teach goes to the theater shows, and most of them make it out to local drum corps shows. Maybe 10 % of those same kids will end up going on to march. The other 90% are your new audiences. Again, random folks on the street are unlikely to understand, or want to understand our activity. As for your Mahanoy reference, Mahanoy City is about an hour from Allentown, home of one of the largest, and most passionate drum corps fan bases in the country. You've also got Philadelphia and New York not too far out of town. You don't think that show drew fans from those areas? Again, more corps in the area = more fans. Edited December 9, 2012 by actucker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
actucker Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 And how is a new person going to be able to evolve or tell the differences if you can't get them to go to another show. What's the old business saying "Getting them in the door is easy. Getting them to come back is the hard part". The kinds of "new fans" we are likely to draw are also likely to have a clue what is going on, and are much more likely to come back to another show. Again, a complete outsider is not going to get it without some help. That's part of being a niche activity. There is nothing wrong with being a niche activity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
actucker Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 But you offered this in response to a post about first-time viewers. They haven't been following along and "evolving". They are forming their first (and perhaps last) impressions based on the comtemporary activity. Well, that is even more paradoxical, considering it was you who just said this: If marching band can serve as a replacement for drum corps at the local level, then drum corps isn't as unique as you claim, now, is it? Marching band is not a replacement in terms of what makes drum corps unique. It is a replacement in terms of what function drum corps used to serve within the community (along with a ton of other community outreach programs). What we seem to disagree on is what makes drum corps unique. You seem to think that its the product (which I would still argue is very different from that of marching band). What I consider unique to drum corps is the experience that the members get from it, which wasn't always present in local community drum corps in the first place. Those local drum corps were not the same as the touring corps. That same separation exists now, we just call those local drum corps high school marching bands. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 (edited) The same reason there are more kids in marching band in high school now. Its an after school activity. The fact that it happens to be tied to a school and drum corps wasn't has very little to do with that fact. Drum corps wasn't replaced in artistic nature by marching band. It was replaced in functionality. 40 years ago, local drum corps was more about community kids having something to do. Now, there are a thousand of outreach programs with the exact same priorities. High school marching band happens to be one of them. That doesn't stop drum corps from being different from marching band. How many new people do you really expect to draw from the general populace? Most of the new audiences get brought in either through having been involved in music already in some way, or having been brought to a show by someone who is already either a fan, or involved somehow. Every marching band kid in the high school band I teach goes to the theater shows, and most of them make it out to local drum corps shows. Maybe 10 % of those same kids will end up going on to march. The other 90% are your new audiences. Again, random folks on the street are unlikely to understand, or want to understand our activity. As for your Mahanoy reference, Mahanoy City is about an hour from Allentown, home of one of the largest, and most passionate drum corps fan bases in the country. You've also got Philadelphia and New York not too far out of town. You don't think that show drew fans from those areas? Again, more corps in the area = more fans. If I get your meaning correctly: You talk about the differences between DC and MB over the years yet talk about audiences like their makeup is the same over the past 40+ years. What makes you think the audience didn't change along with roles of MB/DC and the changes within DC itself? No idea about the Manoney City show I referenced but from talking to people at the Carlisle and Hershey field shows and Harrisburg standstill from year to year (and other one time shot shows) the percentage of non-corps people BITD was a higher percentage. Much as some of todays people bash the past, the music was more recognizible and entertaining to the non-musical people. That DID bring in people who knew nothing about music theory and didn't even know anyone in a corps. Much like the same type of people will go to a band or orchestra concert today if the price is right. You're entitled to your theory but I talked to these people to find out first hand. Let's put it this way... do you honestly think almost all of those 1,000s of people in the stands BITD came because they knew someone in a corps or used to march themselves. I know the Central PA area (55 years now) and there were not THAT many corps. Like I said it was a different time and the audience make up changed along with everything else. Edit: thinking about changes from the early 1960s.... willing to bet it took more than an hour to get to MC BITD from the places you mentioned..... Took a while for Eisenhowers Interstate Highway Act to get rolling in some areas...... Oh Yeah.... the Buccs (Reading) were not at the show..... Edited December 9, 2012 by JimF-LowBari Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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