Carolina Crown 2013

[Fran Haring]

For those complaining about the way the narration is done, watch this video. I get it now...

Just spitballin' here, because I'm a Crown fan... especially of that magnificent brass line...

But I wonder if this is another case of a show that the average person at a given drum corps event will never "get"... because he or she doesn't know about the source material.

Honestly, before I knew about the source source material here... I was puzzled as to how the narration has anything to do with the show theme in this case. And I'm trying to put myself in the position of a fan at a show who feels the same way... and leaves the show wondering, "what the heck was that, and why would I pay to see that again???"

I'm a fan of shows that are understandable at face value, regardless of the theme... without requiring me to "educate" myself about the source material before I can fully enjoy the show.

Not necessarily saying Crown's show will end up being that sort of head-scratcher... there is a lot of time left in the season.... but I do wonder if we're narrowing down the audience to a "niche within a niche within a niche" sometimes.

[Jeff Ream]

I also saw some people having opinions on him raising his voice over the horn line. Here's mine:

My opinion of the voiceovers - I think works in the ballad. However, the speaker needs to convince the audience it works, so he himself needs to believe there is something VERY powerful about what he's saying. Meaning him raising his voice is good to me. Yes, it's to be heard, but it's also something called "feelings" and "emotions".

I mean, here's the deal. This "John" is SO in love, there is no boundary to the love - there is true infinite, forever, no amount of numbers, no measurement of "1, 2, 3, 4" can amount to the quantity of love he holds, which is impossible. Or is it? In his own words, "Impossible, you say?"

And next to all of this infinite amount of love, she sits, asking, "Do you love me, John?" What?? What do you mean, "Do you love me?" Without her, John is nothing! Without her, he becomes finite, he finds his end. He has no reason for being!! She questions his love, but it is so important for her to know how much (which she actually could never know, because it's supposedly infinite). His entire existence is at the mercy of her, and he MUST let her know. He alone cannot be infinite, but he can try his hardest to express it to her. His entire existence is about this moment with her, and all the infinite moments following.

And that is why I like the voice-overs in the ballad, including when he almost shouts, "Without you, I have have no reason for being!" If anything, he could sound more frantic, more intense, more desperate to let her know how much he loves her. I mean, c'mon. He's shooting for infinite here.

and the average person, getting to see it one time, who doesnt care about researching to get a show will be like "WTF?"

[Jeff Ream]

Now don't get weepy on us Jeff! :rolleyes:/>/>

no, not unless I think back to the days when BD did it too

[gak27]

Just spitballin' here, because I'm a Crown fan... especially of that magnificent brass line...

But I wonder if this is another case of a show that the average person at a given drum corps event will never "get"... because he or she doesn't know about the source material.

Honestly, before I knew about the source source material here... I was puzzled as to how the narration has anything to do with the show theme in this case. And I'm trying to put myself in the position of a fan at a show who feels the same way... and leaves the show wondering, "what the heck was that, and why would I pay to see that again???"

I'm a fan of shows that are understandable at face value, regardless of the theme... without requiring me to "educate" myself about the source material before I can fully enjoy the show.

Not necessarily saying Crown's show will end up being that sort of head-scratcher... there is a lot of time left in the season.... but I do wonder if we're narrowing down the audience to a "niche within a niche within a niche" sometimes.

Yes, yes and yes.

[DcFr3aK]

Umm... what? How can it be anything but?

So they are avoiding the risk of being two or three horns short at that moment.

You're just being silly here. They could design around the soloists like they always do: have them get out of line and go to their spots at the appropriate time and rejoin the form later. And it's not like those four folks are the only people who can sing in the corps. I bet they have pit members who can sing the appropriate bits. The girl who's triggering the samples has a voice. If it's a poor voice, then put her on a marimba and use another pit member. Problem solved.

And the sampled portions are gutless.

Well, they are risk takers in some areas and risk averse in others. I do think this show is less risky from a "what will the judges think" point of view than last year's.

I don't really follow your logic with these arguments, or with your use of gutless.

Most corps are opting to have lower numbers in the lower brass sections because they can easily turn up the bass on their synth. Now, how is that NOT gutless (and moving in an odd direction activity wise) but having a mere two sections of Crown's show with sampled CROWN PERFORMERS, gutless?

Gutless? What does that mean?

Do they really have no intestine?

The voice in this show is so integral to the overall feel and flow of this show. The fact that they are actually going over and above any other show I've seen vocalizing to date shows great dedication and COURAGE. Not gutlessness. The subtleties and intricacies of EotB calls for huge concentration for long periods of time. I'm actually surprised they are using live performers at all.

I think you have put up a wall and have decided not to enjoy this show. To each his/her own. Enjoy the rest of the season!

Edited June 21, 2013 by DcFr3aK

[Heath H]

and the average person, getting to see it one time, who doesnt care about researching to get a show will be like "WTF?"

True, most people won't know the source material. But I was talking about the words spoken in the show, without any need for prior research. If you're able to hear (which I'm assuming most DCI audience members can do), you'll know what he's saying.

[MikeD]

I'm glad they made the narration more dramatic. That ballad did feel out of place until after I talked with a friend of mine; he saw it as a demonstration of the right side of the brain. It makes perfect sense since the previous segment is very much a left brain production.

Hmm...than maybe this should be part of the Cadet's show! :tongue:/>

[c mor]

Since this is a most talked about thread, here is a link of the BD Drumline

-Practicing Full Show

Dude!! Thread crashing - not cool.

[N.E. Brigand]

I don't really follow your logic with these arguments, or with your use of gutless. Most corps are opting to have lower numbers in the lower brass sections because they can easily turn up the bass on their synth. Now, how is that NOT gutless (and moving in an odd direction, activity-wise), but having a mere two sections of Crown's show with sampled CROWN PERFORMERS, gutless?

It ought to be obvious that it takes more guts, is riskier, is braver, etc., to have singers perform live than to prerecord them. People on these forums have been arguing against the use samples for that very reason. Why should Crown be exempt from the same criticism other corps got before them?

[N.E. Brigand]

Since some people keep referring others to the source music to explain what Crown is doing, I'd like to reiterate the point that TheClutch made in the Mesa thread: it's quite reasonable to decide that the original material is no good!

So, here is a theater review in New York magazine of the 1984 revival:

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I clearly lack the space to do justice to Einstein on the Beach, an alleged opera in four acts lasting 70 minutes apiece, or one act of ignominy lasting over four and a half hours. What in 1976 was the emperor's not-so-new clothes is in 1984 the tattered rags of inane avant-gardism. Although Robert Wilson has a certain gift for creating stage images, jauntily enhanced by his and Beverly Emmons's lighting, there is no excuse for making these pictures last hours; in a few minutes of your time, a de Chirico or Magritte can do them better. The text of scant words endlessly repeated is sheer nonsense; though it required the combined wits of Christopher Knowles, Samuel H. Johnson, and Lucinda Childs, any half-wit could have done as much by himself. The minimalist choreography, presumably for people who abhor dancing, is by Miss Childs; the music and lyrics are by Philip Glass.

To take the lyrics first: they are either the names of the near-identical note sequences relentlessly repeated, e.g., "Sol, si, do, fa, sol, si, fa, do," or sequences of numerals, e.g., "two, two, three, three, four, four," chanted ad nauseam. Anyone who can take credit for solfege and kiddie maths as lyrics has, evidently, neither a sense of words nor a sense of shame. That he is an utter no-talent is confirmed by the similarly misnamed "music." This is music either for musical ignoramuses or for people who will get on any trendy bandwagon, even if the band is mostly a synthesizer and the wagon hardly moves. It must be best for the completely stoned. In fact, Einstein on the Beach is a four-and-a-half-hour ma--------ry daydream for people too unimaginative to have their own daydreams and too lazy or impotent to m--------e.

The usual defense of Einstein is that "it turned me around" or "it completely changes your sense of time." But although I fervently champion art as an eye-, ear-, mind-, and soul-opener, I see no point in changing our sense of time. Our great problem is that we do not sufficiently understand and appreciate the shortness of our time, that we do not (and, apparently, will not) comprehend how much great art of all kinds there is in this world in which our time is so short that we can explore only a fraction of its wonders. Hence it is stupid and vicious to entice people into wasting hours of their brief span on minimalist drivel nauseatingly repeated until they feel--as if under the influence of drugs--timelessly afloat in some nihilist nirvana. As it is, many in the audience kept going out into the lobby to eat, drink, socialize, i.e., be seen, rather than watch the show. Many others sensibly "turned around" early and simply left. Ask yourself how much Bartok, Berg, Stravinsky, and Janacek you have listened to before you waste your time on Glass; how much real theater, ballet, and art you have seen before you hypnotize and heroinize yourself into Robert Wilson's solipsism.

Thus, did you attend one of the two performances [... review concludes with a paragraph praising a performance of a Honegger oratorio].

[Collected in John Simon on Theater: Criticism 1974-2003 (New York: Applause, 2005)]

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Now there are a few possible replies to be made to a review like Simon's in light of Crown's show.

One is that he's wrong--or, if you prefer, that tastes differ. Glass has many admirers. A friend of mine who professionally reviews classical music in the San Francisco area enjoys Glass's music for some of the very reasons that Simon disparages. (And as Simon himself has written more than once, the final arbiter is time. Check back in a hundred years and Glass may be as admired as Beethoven or remembered only in obscure footnotes.) Also, I suspect that some people might agree with Simon's verdict on Einstein but not with his enjoyment of Honegger or Bartok (BRASSO, I'm looking at you).

Another is that Crown is improving on Glass, for instance, by not wasting 270 minutes of our time. Or that the instrumentation or staging that drum corps offers is superior to what was possible in the theater performance that Simon endured--even if Glass himself would disagree. This would not be the first drum corps show that is better than its source.

But a third response, the one I started from, is equally valid: that Crown has picked poor material that works no more for them than it did on the stage. It's OK for someone to feel that way--though anyone who appreciates drum corps should give Crown the chance to convince them.

For myself, I haven't seen the show, not even on video. I may enjoy it very much, although as a general rule, I dislike amplified voice in drum corps very much, and sampled voice even more. But maybe this show will change my mind, or those aspects will seem only minor blemishes on an otherwise brilliant production.