What will help DCI become more entertaining

[perc2100]

One sentence he (Cesario) uttered that day sticks with me:

"judges are fans too. Sure you get all technical, and we will reward it because of the words on the sheets. But we want to cheer, we want to laugh, we want to cry....it's up to the designers to finally make that happen".

This is SO true, and when I judge I'm almost a little taken aback at how I approach viewing & evaluating groups. As a teacher, I typically have a "I'm never super happy, nothing is ever perfect, and I'm watching performances waiting to hear mistakes, getting tense during phrases that I know are difficult & MIGHT have problems" mindset.

When I evaluate groups as a judge, I walk in WANTING them to rock my world, expecting them to be great every time. When they achieve an effect or a musical passage that they're going for, I'm genuinely really happy; when they have a great run, I'm just as excited as the average audience member, the kids' staff, etc. When they have problems I want to call them out in hopes that they fix it for next time (whether I adjudicate them or not). I am truly a bigger fan of other peoples' ensembles while I'm judging them than I am at any other time. When I'm teaching, I could care less about any other group than my own students. I don't want to see anyone, I'm not interested in seeing competition, etc: I focus on my kids, fixing their issues, getting them prepared, et al.

EVERY judge I've ever conversed with is the same way. They sometimes have differing opinions on what is a "better" show design or stylistic approach, but in the end they have the same exact goals and expectations as instructors & other fans. They want to see every group achieve & max out their show, they want to see a cohesive show design, they want to hear clean beats & impeccable tone, they want uniform technique, etc.

Entertainment, is such a broad concept: mainstream entertainment even broader. The key for a judge isn't even "am I rewarding a show I personally like," it's "I am rewarding a show based on how they are achieving the specific rubric on my sheet." Entertainment, even based on perceived "audience applause volume" or something that someone MIGHT think would be easy to measure, is hard to measure, especially when the judge is consumed with evaluating minutia of other performance and design aspects (while ranking them with other shows of the evening). At the end of the day, a judge is indeed a fan of the activity, quite possibly more so than the average DCP fan (who likely has a long history of involvement in the activity).

[The Other Mike]

An easy solution would seem to be to not read this discussion!

and miss all this edumacated info ?

[MikeD]

And to be fair, if we're talking about attendance & ticket sales, it seems kind of silly to prop one show/one attendance figure above all. Yes, it's Championships and it is a big deal: but isn't it more important if total attendance is up across the board?

From picking apart various reports of finals paid attendance, I see this from the "Indy Years", so to speak...relatively flat.

2012 Indy 17820

2011 Indy 17363

2010 Indy 15900

2009 Indy 17865

[Jeff Ream]

And my point is that in the modern show design the 'communication' to the judges by the design staff (via direct written explanations, vocal explanations,...) is vastly different, and way more intricate and in depth, than just the one-shot music/visual-only communication to the audience (via music, drill, and props). Therefore, the judges have a huge advantage of seeing, hearing, and most importantly understanding the show concept designs. Do you remember the libretto (i.e. communication) the Regiment staff was forced to hand out to the audience for the original Spartacus show back in the eighties? We are now at a point where to understand the modern show concepts the judges now have to be presented with such materials; and it would take more than just a libretto (more like an entire book) to educate the audience!!! And because the explanation (communication) material today is presented just to the judges not to the audience that is a major reason why many judges 'get' the shows but the audiences do not!! Moreover, reading a libretto at a drum corps show of all places was bad enough; imagine today if all of the show concepts were explained (i.e. communicated) to the audience the way the design staff are having to explain them to the judges (music appreciation and history classes with books and books of written explanations sitting in the stands at a drum corps show; yuck!!!!)

Stu,

You can have shows with incredible depth that communicate to the judges and the fans! The problem is that it's usually performance issues that hold those corps back from the top spots. Crown was super deep last year, and fans everywhere lit babies on fire and burned them and threw them at thecorps....but the percussion was dirty as hell and, IMO, the hop skip jump stuff kept the visual scores down.

You're looking to the word communicate in a different way than Michael was. he means communicate to the judges not via meetings or librettos...he means reach inside their souls, their hearts,.....let them not just be judges, but be fans too!! the biggest issue is the effect sheet. IMO, the flaw with effect is a corps can be super heavy programming for the intellectual and be rewarded to the max...but be short on the emotional and aesthetic. To me, and many people, thethought for effect should be that a corps should be balanced on all 3...and you can be super deep with this....and that's the best way to achieve maximum effect. However the system doesn't seem to work that way.

That's what Michael has been aiming for....be deep.....but cover all facets of the triad of effect....and in turn you score well AND you get burning babies thrown at you.....if you perform it well.

Cadets Angels and Demons is a perfect example....everyone got it. Ins ome cases, you could see the moments coming before they got there. And people cheered even if it was a touch predictable....but you had a lot of intellectual effect, you had tons of emotional effect and you had tons of aesthetic effect. Same for Phantom in 08, and I know people who saw it and had no idea the Spartacus story and actually thought the music was from the movie, not the ballet.

But then you have a BD 08-12, which is overly heavy on the intellectual side, yet it pops huge numbers. That's the disconnect.

[Jeff Ream]

And to be fair, if we're talking about attendance & ticket sales, it seems kind of silly to prop one show/one attendance figure above all. Yes, it's Championships and it is a big deal: but isn't it more important if total attendance is up across the board?

well...both are important. Finals is THE show...the end all, imagine.....for NCAA March Madness, you play in a 20,000 seat arena all year, then you go to the big game....and it's in a 9,000 seat venue. Or worse, you go to a dome and only get 20,000. total season is important, but finals I dare say is equal, especially finanically.....with the ticket prices in place, that's the one show that can actually make the corps a ton of money.

Maybe it's me, but doing a mid season show and getting more people there than the biggest show of the year at the end is not a good sign. if anything it shows the finals venue is the issue many people say it is

[Jeff Ream]

This is SO true, and when I judge I'm almost a little taken aback at how I approach viewing & evaluating groups. As a teacher, I typically have a "I'm never super happy, nothing is ever perfect, and I'm watching performances waiting to hear mistakes, getting tense during phrases that I know are difficult & MIGHT have problems" mindset.

When I evaluate groups as a judge, I walk in WANTING them to rock my world, expecting them to be great every time. When they achieve an effect or a musical passage that they're going for, I'm genuinely really happy; when they have a great run, I'm just as excited as the average audience member, the kids' staff, etc. When they have problems I want to call them out in hopes that they fix it for next time (whether I adjudicate them or not). I am truly a bigger fan of other peoples' ensembles while I'm judging them than I am at any other time. When I'm teaching, I could care less about any other group than my own students. I don't want to see anyone, I'm not interested in seeing competition, etc: I focus on my kids, fixing their issues, getting them prepared, et al.

EVERY judge I've ever conversed with is the same way. They sometimes have differing opinions on what is a "better" show design or stylistic approach, but in the end they have the same exact goals and expectations as instructors & other fans. They want to see every group achieve & max out their show, they want to see a cohesive show design, they want to hear clean beats & impeccable tone, they want uniform technique, etc.

Entertainment, is such a broad concept: mainstream entertainment even broader. The key for a judge isn't even "am I rewarding a show I personally like," it's "I am rewarding a show based on how they are achieving the specific rubric on my sheet." Entertainment, even based on perceived "audience applause volume" or something that someone MIGHT think would be easy to measure, is hard to measure, especially when the judge is consumed with evaluating minutia of other performance and design aspects (while ranking them with other shows of the evening). At the end of the day, a judge is indeed a fan of the activity, quite possibly more so than the average DCP fan (who likely has a long history of involvement in the activity).

exactly. having just judged a local circuits championships, and the lowest class, I found myself playing cheerleader. One show in particular was doing it's darnedest to pull off of PA and into GE....it was that #### funny and well performed...and in fact, despite not winning it's class, was one of the most talkedabout shows of the weekend.

I love being able to run a recording and give up a "yeah!" or a "woohoo" or "oh wow awesome!" In many ways, since kids often hear the recordings, it lets them know we're just bigger versions of them.

But sadly too often I'll go to critique and just hear about "demand, demand, demand".

[perc2100]

So...are you saying BD expressed their show (Minus technical achievement of coarse) far better than the Jersey Surf? I don't really agree.

BD ABSOLUTELY expressed their show FAR better than Jersey Surf, in every way. And you can't brush off "technical achievement," when performance is a major part of every single sheet. You can be effective if you're performing dirty. Blue Devils conveyed a nuanced, programmed that maxed out the sheets in just about every conceivable way.

Surf presented a VERY broad show that was a homage to a crowd-pleasing corps from several decades ago. There was no nuance, and it was nothing but audience pandering.

Both corps were great, and there IS a place (need) for both of those types of shows. But only one of those corps really even attempted to max out the design half of the sheets. That is absolutely undeniable.

Just about any fan could tell you what the Jersey Surf were expressing/projecting....I am confident we can't say the same thing about BD's show. If judges are 'fans'....then they should have grasped on to the Surf show much easier than grabbing on to BD's show.

1) THE JUDGES grasped what Blue Devils were going for. The judges are the ones trained and experienced in recognizing the nuances of what a corps is doing and how it relates to their specific sheets. The audience doesn't explicitly NEED to be able to do that, and in the end when it comes to ranking/rating groups they're the ONLY ones who's understanding of what a corps is doing matters.

2) you are totally misconstruing "entertainment" with the other factors of the sheets. What's more, I think many fans look at the whole of the show, and wonder why judge's are rewarding "entertainment," and kinda forget that the total score is made of up several judges evaluating specific, very narrow aspects of the show (even the effect judges who have a slightly more broad scope of what they're evaluating are still only evaluating specific aspects).

Would be very interesting to see how much of a show design a judge grasps on their own (Without endless information from a corps staff about their show...verbal and written).

I admittedly do not mingle with the majority of DCP folks, so I can't begin to guess what the perception of judges are from the wide array of posters. But you seem to have a very different idea of what a judge does, what their knowledge & expertise is, etc. I think you would be SHOCKED how much judges pick up on a first read of show, without talking to designers previously. Obviously knowing more about a show (or any artwork, really), brings deeper appreciation and understanding. There's nothing wrong with that, and to be a bit blunt with, say, Blue Devils 2013 there is FAR more "underneath the surface" to gain from chatting with a designer than there is with, say, Jersey Surf. If you have a show that sparks conversations and debates about meaning and expression, you're probably doing something right; conversely, if you have a show this is nothing but nostalgic music arrangements, you have an entertaining show that is vapid. There is PLENTY to "get" from BD's show without even caring about the dada art movement, but having a better understanding of the dada movement enhances ones feeling about the show (I know plenty of people who have a real strong understanding of dada that HATED Blue Devils show and thought it was a pretty poor representation of legit dada, but that's a different discussion )

[perc2100]

exactly. having just judged a local circuits championships, and the lowest class, I found myself playing cheerleader. One show in particular was doing it's darnedest to pull off of PA and into GE....it was that #### funny and well performed...and in fact, despite not winning it's class, was one of the most talkedabout shows of the weekend.

I love being able to run a recording and give up a "yeah!" or a "woohoo" or "oh wow awesome!" In many ways, since kids often hear the recordings, it lets them know we're just bigger versions of them.

But sadly too often I'll go to critique and just hear about "demand, demand, demand".

NO KIDDING! Or I'll hear snare drummer instructors fail to grasp a) the importance of a good front ensemble and b) the need to balance the battery to the front ensemble (or really, the importance of constantly rehearsing WITH the front ensemble).

It's funny, as a staffer/designer I love to spar with the judges about what their missing, why my group is achieving at high levels, etc. As a judge, I don't mind sparring with staffers from the opposite end. Of course, my wife will tell anyone I've never been one to shy away from arguing

[perc2100]

I think anyone watching that brings in revenue to DCI is the best barometer, if you want to use champs.

The best barometer is season attendance at all DCI events, if evaluating the health of the activity around the country is the goal...IMO of course.

I agree: ANY viewing/audience source that directly leads to financial gain for DCI is a paying customer. Watching a free broadcast on PBS COST DCI money and may or may not have indirectly led to revenue for DCI. However, my Fan Network subscription directly brought cash to DCI in return for me streaming DCI regionals & Semis.

[fecontra]

I received a flyer from YEA hawking a new location in Allentown PA.

To me it makes sense , what didn't was not a single mention of " Drum Corps " on the flyer.

I guess what is needed is to refer to things as " Marching Music Ensembles ".

That should make everything better!