BD Versus Crown

[Brutus]

Blue Devils - Rite of Spring

Crown- 2001

I’ve got a lot of blowhard opinions. So, take ‘em or leave ‘em. I’m a published author, a produced screenwriter, and I’ve acted on television. I’ve got horrible ideas, and some good ones, and you just have to take it or leave it, but I’m not backing down. So, get your Vicotin and your poppers, and get ready to half-enjoy.

HIGHLIGHTS

--BD’s show is so confidently performed, so astoundingly intricate and completely unique in mood and style that it really becomes an entirely new art form.

--Crown’s show is more literal, more relatable, more emotionally stirring, more universally human, and ultimately more memorable. It has the powerful emotional resonance of Our Town by Thornton Wilder, and it will be studied for decades.

BLUE DEVILS

The Blue Devils Rite of spring has a Cirque du Soleil, exquisite, dream-like weirdness about it. (The show designers apparently emailed their show designs direct from a performance art barge featuring helium swimwear and asparagus martinis.) Without the Cirque du Soleil as a cultural reference for the style of this show, the designers would surely be carted off by anyone with the power to commit. The show is gorgeous and absurd and unsettling, like eating a Cobb salad in the dark. But by God, I think they may have invented a new art form.

BD’s confusing mélange of phrases and moods, cross-bows, obelisks and balls is based on the Stravinsky original symphony, but most of it is frankly unrecognizable. In fact nothing in the show is really relatable to anything in the realm of human experience. And apparently Stravinsky intended it that way. “My music is best understood by children and animals," he said. Maybe children can explain the use of the obelisk other than to cheat formations.

So, try to explain it to someone. BD’s show. Go ahead. Okay, I’ll start. This show is a modern Cirque du Soleil-style drum and bugle corps which has evolved from military drum and fife corps, and plays a piece of Russian classical music through the lens of modern jazz.” That’s a pretty busy concept, as performing arts go. So, this is a production that is an interpretation of an interpretation of interpretation, but because it is performed with such grace, it somehow transcends its ridiculously confused artistic origins.

So, why does this show even bother to claim Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring as its jumping off point? For artistic validation? Or because Spring is the only solid concept the show has going for it? Girls, you’re so beyond that right now, don’t even bother referencing an original piece of music. Screw Stravinsky. At some point, a composer has gotta have balls enough to create his or her own music, and have guts enough to say it’s based on nothing but their own amazing invention.

I bet that Crown’s corps members would agree on what their show means. But BD’s members, because of the abstract nature of the show, couldn’t possibly agree. The show is not definable in words. It’s so removed from narrative structure, and so abstract, that any consensus on a description about its meaning would be a cosmic accident. Words can’t describe it, at least not on first viewing. And to be honest, some of that ambivalence comes through in the performance. Hey, if you don’t know what it means, even on an emotional level, how are we in the audience gonna begin to try?

A word about these gifted young performers. The Blue Devils guard has icy cool, Cirque -quality skills. They’re Broadway-worthy, zero body fat dancers and acrobats, with a poise and stage presence that waft over you like dry ice at a dance club. It’s the cold-blooded refinement that you see in exquisitely talented athletes, or those Cirque performers as they concentrate before diving into a pool of water four stories below, or when they spin wildly in the air until another acrobat grabs them by the elbow. The BD color guard catches red bowling balls in their armpits, okay? They produce oxbows from their navels. There’s no equipment changing here, the equipment changes itself. The BD horn players and drummers are in peak physical condition, and seem almost impervious to emotion, almost inhuman. At first you think you’re looking at a drop of sweat coming off a drummer’s earlobe, but then it dawns on you-- it’s a diamond earring. Of course there’s no sweat here. That would be a sign of humanness.

I have a problem with corps show designs that are too abstract. There, I said it. And the only thing worse than having a show made up of random jazz moments like this, is when you end it by breaking down and throwing it all away for a park and blow moment at the end. Kinda like, “Well, you endured the esoteric stuff, so now we’re going to reward you with some relatable rock and roll volume.” They almost break character at the end. They “drop the ball.” Why do this so late in the game? You freaking wore a batman outfit to prom, dude, don’t give up now that it’s eleven o’clock. Keep on. Believe in yourself. The ending’s got to go, or add some stylistic movement to it, because right now, the ending belongs in a different show.

Now here’s my overall rant about Jazz in this show. If you’re going to play jazz, and if you’re going to dabble in abstraction, it is essential, absolutely essential that you improvise in the show. Absolutely essential. A show based on a musical genre emanating from improvisation must have musical soloist improvisation if it is going to be thematically aligned, if it’s going to be legitimate, and if it’s going to soar. Period. You have these incredible musicians, grab the opportunity make this about improvisation. Thematically, this show is about breaking tradition, randomness, creativity in the moment and innovation-- they all lend themselves to musical improvisation. As far as I can tell, there’s none here, and it’s a missed opportunity of gross proportions.

QUICK TAKES

--Soloists - robotic, rigid, atonal, where’s the improvisation? .

--Tatto guard uniforms - body tattoos! The costume designs are elegant beyond belief.

--None of BD’s music was hummable. Just an observation.

--What’s with the head-down robot-like marching in parts of this-- this belongs in Crown’s show, but not here.

CAROLINA CROWN

Crown won the applause meter tonight. And for good reason.

This brilliant show starts with an almost grim avalanche of numbers and equations. Crown inundates you with a sea of calculations. It’s a tightly woven tapestry of space themed symphonic and electronic pieces, including the hummable theme from 2001 A Space Odyssey and by the end, it’s clear, that as that last girl runs toward the end zone and stops, you know. This is our job. We’re doing the work of running toward the end zone, making discoveries, and building meaning into our lives through music.

This show is packed with powerful musical moments, with plenty of controlled abstraction, placed in a context-- the only way that abstraction is bearable to watch. The show is funny. The robotic movements are funny and point up the absurdity of our workaday world. And midway, the theme of love comes into play. Simply and cleanly, pointing up the absurdities of our relationships, and the gravitas of human love.

The vocals are professional and convincing like Hal in 2001. The sticks that the guard use need to be cleaned up. A lot. Messy as hell. They’ll get to it. No matter.

This show is profound. There, I said it. This show is about being human among the billions and billions of stars in our infinite universe. Uniquely human. With the capacity to love, and the capacity to test our limits. It’s about the universal gift of humor. It’s about clocks ticking, and algebra. And food and coffee. And new ironed dresses and hot baths....and sleeping and waking up. And putting on your uniform, and polishing your horn. It’s about throwing a rifle that spins so fast and high in the air that for a moment it looks like a star. Oh, earth,you are too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every,every minute? The show is breathtaking in its humanity. And stirs the soul.

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Edited July 6, 2013 by Brutus

[DCImonkey]

[DrumcorpsmademeaTuba]

Never have I seen so many words typed without a single thing actually being said.:worthy:/>

[skevinp]

Boo's liner notes are getting stranger and stranger.

[wallace]

I thought the review was quite good and very entertaining.

BTW, SKevinP, I love your signature. It's very clever.

[jaylogan]

I absolutely love BD's show right now. I just can't get it any of it out of my head.

Crown's show is great. It may just win this year, but there's something about BD's show that just draws me to it. Can't explain it.

That being said, I'm rooting for The Cavaliers and The Cadets the most, and this year's shows by ALL the corps I've heard so far are perhaps the greatest set of shows in recent memory, collectively speaking. Good job everyone!

[Schnitzel]

Some very interesting interpretations and insights . . . thanks for taking the time to share!

[Geoff]

Moved to the review forum.

[jwillis35]

Brutus: That was an excellent take on both Crown and BD from an emotional, artistic, analytic, and theoretical perspective. A great read with some excellent analysis. I especially like the following quote by you in regard to BD:

"This show is a modern Cirque du Soleil-style drum and bugle corps which has evolved from military drum and fife corps, and plays a piece of Russian classical music through the lens of modern jazz. That’s a pretty busy concept, as performing arts go. So, this is a production that is an interpretation of an interpretation of interpretation, but because it is performed with such grace, it somehow transcends its ridiculously confused artistic origins."

Thank you for the artistic vision and the poetic way that you have described both BD and Crown.

[DonR]

Thank you very much for this.