When did the terminology change?

[MikeD]

Did drum corps "evolve" into bands or is it the other way around? As a band person who has followed drum corps for nearly 40 years, most of the innovations I saw first on the drum corps field later made their way to bands. What has changed is that most bands do not try and duplicate what they see done by a drum corps first as they would have not too long ago, but drum corps still sets the standard. Now as I say this, I know there are very innovative bands, but I don't think we're at the point where drum corps x says band y did this so we have to do it too.

In my area, the real move towards 'corps-style' bands and organized circuit competitions took off starting in the 70's, accelerating through the 80's to where we are today. A number of things contributed to this. Drum corps vets were going into music ed in higher numbers, and then becoming HS band directors. Once there, they brought their corps experience to MB. The decline in numbers of smaller local corps meant that instructors had fewer options to teach, and the newly minted drum-corps experienced band directors started to hire corps instuctors to write and teach corps-style bands. Judges had fewer corps shows to judge, so the judging associations started to push the competitive band movement...in my area you had NJA with the TOB circuit and then MAA with the EMBA circuit. Circuits like Cavalcade of Bands, NYSFBC, PIMBA, Cavalcade, NESBA, and then CMBC/USSBA/USBands became very popular with the competing bands.