Fran Haring Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 Seriously... hats off to Brasso and Garfield for their recent "summary" posts. Very well-said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 ... Without stepping on too many toes, I hope, can we agree that the men in the guards need to be playing "men", not 'unisex" characters... Did not step on my toes, but.... androgynous musicians certainly have made millions and millions and millions of dollars in the world of free market entertainment (Marylin Manson, David Bowie, Michael Jackson, Boy George, Prince, ...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slingerland Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 Did not step on my toes, but.... androgynous musicians certainly have made millions and millions and millions of dollars in the world of free market entertainment (Marylin Manson, David Bowie, Michael Jackson, Boy George, Prince, ...) Yes - in 1983. The only people who would think that 80s style androgyny would be cutting edge today would be truly geekish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slingerland Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 (edited) dupe Edited February 26, 2013 by Slingerland Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 (edited) Yes - in 1983. The only people who would think that 80s style androgyny would be cutting edge today would be truly geekish. Wrong... Marylin Manson has sold out concerts (today in 2013); Placebo has a huge following (today in 2013); current British band Amorphous Androgynous sells out venues (today in 2013); even the old fart Mick Jagger and the Stones still sell out NASCAR size venues (today in 2013); and the dead Michale Jackson still sells a very high rate of Mp3s (today in 2013); this is not a 'stuck in the eighties' phenomenon and more and more androgynous artists are cropping up all the time in all of the arts; need I continue? Edited February 26, 2013 by Stu Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 They're all very easy to separate, actually, and yes, you read what I wrote exactly correctly. All of those characteristics you cite are pretty much shared by the same group of corps. Pretty much? No, each of those characteristics is manifest in a different set of corps. And they are not as easily stereotyped as either A or B, the way you make it sound. Once again, the groups you called out for separation were: Corps who do not tour nationally (only a few out west) Corps who do not compete on the same level (by your context, the bottom four WC corps) Smaller corps (only four small corps remain, two out west and two that tour to DCI Championships) Community-based corps (this varies without strict correlation to class or competitive stature, and without distinct demarcation) Teaching corps, as opposed to corps with mostly college aged, experienced kids (again, this varies without distinct demarcation) Your comments were full of other remarks mixed together, like: Do not have the inclination or ability to raise money Do not have the interest in doing a national tour Smaller corps perform simpler shows Fledgling corps After seeing so many of these remarks, and seeing you still claim contrary to reality that all these different factors appear in the same corps, I can only surmise that you do not really understand these corps after all – you just want them out. Get off my lawn! I do not know why else you would continue to try and paint them all with one broad brush. But I still have no idea how many of “them” you want off your lawn. Open Class is there to give their kids a chance to do drum corps, learn how it is played, have some fun doing it, and not have to sell a kidney in order to finance it. That's a beautiful thing - the thing that would make it even better would be if all of the marketing efforts went to promoting them as stars of their league, not as "also on the program" performers, as happens now all too often. I will ask again, then – why does that matter so much to you? Businesses are capable of marketing more than one product. Organizations who don't have the interest, ability, need, desire, or means to tour nationally and compete with the corps who DO have the interests and means to do all those things should be competing in a different league altogether. They already are. Open class has their own separate BOD, their own separate coordinator, their own separate budget, their own separate tour, their own separate sheets, and their own separate championship. Put that in front of most normal adults and they'll agree with my positions. The worlds of sports and business normally sort themselves into logical affiliations, either by regions, capacity, product categories, or competitive level; DCI is resistant to that in part because (I suspect) some adults associated with the various corps would feel offended if their corps was classified as a regional corps rather than a national touring corps. How is DCI resistant to that? All those separate things I just mentioned were created by DCI direction. Again, you have to look at the situation as a business question, not as anything having to do with pride or passion or ego. Why do I have to look at this as a business question? I choose to look at both business and mission, as I would expect from the people running DCI. The business of DCI is to sell tickets to events and other products and bring in money that can be returned to the co-op members in exchange for their work. The ability to do that would be enhanced, not weakened, if the message and the imagery they were able to use was consistent and clean, if their product could be easily defined as "the Top 16 (or 18) drum corps in the world." But you cannot establish that unless those corps are competing (and defeating) the other corps. Separating them so that they never compete head to head, as was done 2003-2010, leaves doubt as to how many of them really are the top X corps. Creating a separate league for the 7 would create similar doubt surrounding whether they even are the top 7, in contrast to the knowledge we have from 2012 competition where they were the top 6 plus the 8th place corps. So anyway, seems from the above that what you are really looking for is a “top 18” separation. If I am misinterpreting or oversimplifying, please correct me. Okay, so say we are looking at the top 18 becoming your enhanced world class (with Glassmen out, that would now include Oregon Crusaders). Tell me why Jersey Surf should be evicted from WC, based on your numerous criteria for separation above. They do the DCI ordained “full tour”. They compete at the same level. They are not a small corps. Their members are not locally limited. It must be because they are a teaching corps, then – but how does one know this? To be brutally honest, there are some organizations that are now classified as "World Class" by DCI's system who really aren't. We all know it, we just hesitate to say it out loud for fear of offending the members and supporters of those corps. No, we refrain from saying it because it is not true. The DCI system for class division is based on financial and organizational criteria, which makes sense because the fundamental difference between the classes is the amount of touring they do. So corps are measured by attributes that determine their ability to do that amount of touring. If you would rather go back to having a class division based on competitive placement, just say so. That is an outdated notion, but some still hold it. DCI has moved on because they found it made more sense to bring in corps to their touring division who were financially capable, rather than corps with a few good years of competitive results who would not last. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 Thinking aloud, maybe it's time for a total re-boot of DCI, with a buy-in similar to the letter of credit that the original founders had to put together in order to get the first championship underway. If DCI said they were looking for 18 members to come in at $150k each, that would give the re-booted venture $2.7 million in new capital to go out and hire some additional marketing and sponsorship folks, find a way to put the product back on tv, and do a serious re-branding of the whole enterprise. TV? Been there, done that - not cost effective. Evolving technologies have replaced the drum corps TV telecasts with theater shows and an endless array of Internet options for accomplishing the same things the telecasts did, but at much lower cost. As for the $150,000 buy in, I invite every corps who is up for that to post here. That will show us how many corps are willing and able to make that kind of initial investment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 Not necessarily. Looking at the 990s thread last night, there were a few corps down in the rankings who would likely have the financial capability to work with their Boards and their communities to come up with some money for a fresh capitalization. I think what people forget is that the original members of DCI all made personal guarantees in order to get the thing off the ground; that sense of shared risk was helpful in letting them work together and seek consensus in hiring their first executive team (Pesceone and Whitely(?) and in making decisions designed to improve their visibility and financial capacity. They'd all taken a risk, they were all going to share in the reward. A fresh capitalization would serve as a put-up or shut-up gut check for some of those who are currently talking big about DCI's future. If the guys behind Crown and Vanguard and BD et al really think they're ready to kick it up a notch at the DCI level, then here's a chance to provide the seed money for their own expansion without having to go out on their own to do it. According to posts here, those corps put their money where their mouths were. $3250 each, in fact. But that is nowhere near the amounts you are discussing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 I think the looming question is really what is DCI? Not what is has been historically or what is had been in the 80's or what is it right now. More specifically.... if DCI is to actually survive as a brand (not as an organization, but a brand... these are two very distinct concepts), what must done? What does this look like? I do not think there is much hope for a future of DCI as an organization, at least in current form. By separating the brand and historical assets from the operating activities, this could take a lot of the pressure off. What I mean... If the DCI brand and historical assets were moved into simply a holding entity that licenses back use of that brand to individual show sponsors, this could be interesting. Get DCI as an organization out of the business of the revenue distribution side or coordinating the tour schedule. You have brought this idea up repeatedly. And it has been pointed out that it will never happen because of the concern that a group of 7 corps might use that opportunity to do an end around on DCI copyrights, claim unfettered rights to their historical DCI audio/video, and then leave to do the Music in Motion, Inc. tour. Payouts for shows would be negotiated directly and privately between the individual show sponsor and the individual corps (as it should be in the first place). This would allow for strictly market-based booking. Market based booking is already available now - in the open market. Any corps that prefers market based booking is free to leave DCI and try it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted February 26, 2013 Share Posted February 26, 2013 I think a lot of people throw around the term kids a lot. This is actually a distinction between the different performance levels of the activity. While a lot of the open class corps do actually deal with kids, the top performing world class corps are dealing with young adults. These young adults are not there to learn how to play or really getting much of an educational experience. They might learn a specific technique or approach, but they show up already knowing how to play, how to move... and know it cold. This is very different from open class corps teaching kids fundamentals. There is a huge distinction here between providing an educational experience for kids and a performance opportunity for young adults. So you are contending that top corps do not teach? And that the top corps experience is not educational? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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