What do you think is wrong with Drum Corps today (if anything)?

[dcibrando]

I'm curious on everyone's thoughts

also, what do we do about the judging system? What would you do if you had full control over changes in DCI next year

Edited July 16, 2013 by dcibrando

[garfield]

Just wanted to be the first to say "This will be fun!"

I'm going to find some cover to hide behind before the bullets start flying.

[dcibrando]

which is why I started this debate - I'm curious on what the majority think on all of this - the good and the bad

most of all what you would do if you had full control to change things up if at all

[JKT90]

I'm curious on everyone's thoughts

also, what do we do about the judging system? What would you do if you had full control over changes in DCI next year

Regarding the judging system I am not sure what you could do to change it. Some of these judges are friends with a few corp directors and there is a personal relationship there. I've also heard of some corp directors intimidating judges by subtly hinting that they can damage their professional career (implied not an outright threat). I don't see how that can be monitored outside of DCI when they are doing their day job. The one thing that might change things would the corps line up/gate times. Do random draws to determine gate times. That won't happen though...so, the small change that could be done is to have a DCI Judge oversight person. He or she would be responsible for censoring judges, review funny looking scores and have the judge justify the ranking/score, set standards to help ensure consistency from judge to judge and west coast v east coast.

The only way real change will take place would be me hitting the lottery and doing a hostile take care over of DCI

[2muchcoffeeman]

The entirety of the DCP World Class Corps Discussions forum, jammed into a single thread.

[bawker]

To me (and just me), I'd goose the sheets to make visual GE just a little less important, and give music GE just a slight edge over it. I think that alone could change the flow and programming on so many shows it would cover a lot of the "where's the musical phrasing?" or "chop 'n bop" complaints that people have had over the years about drum corps.

Yeah, I know drum corps is about the blending of music/visual ("art that moves!"), but I guess I've always come down on the side of trying to shape the visual production to the will of the music charts.

I couldn't tell you too many drill moves from the 1993 Blue Devils, but I know that entire music book in my head (note: this is not an indication that I want G bugles, or some other DINO RAWR SMASH stuff, just an observation: look at the amount of threads devoted to "favorite drill moves" versus "favorite music charts" for where I'm going with this).

Not real worried about A&E and other stuff . . .at this point, I just want to be entertained. Anybody knows this far along in the A&E game that you have to cover your bases first with the primary ingredients of brass, percussion, and guard before you look at adding those kinds of things organically, lest you end up with BAC 2004 (shudder).

Every drum corps since the beginning of time has programmed to what the sheets want, so any sort of far reaching "change" has to come from tweaking the judging criteria that has been set.

I have no idea how to accomplish said tweak above, though.

[BozzlyB]

I would make GE, the most subjective of the captions (see the absurd level of disagreement between the two GE judges at MN) worth much less of the total score.

[Tez]

I think the main problem with DCI show designs lately revolve around the fact that they are taking elements which have been used and accepted in BOA (and other high school marching bank circuits) for a long time and bringing them to drum corps. The problem though is that many of these elements (badly done voice overs, horrible synth string sounds, thunderous goo, etc...) are used to mask the deficiencies of high school groups, yet sound completely unprofessional when paired against college music major-level DCI musicians. The designers and judges have come to accept these as part of the sound of the activity because they are also so involved in those other activities. Us that mostly just pay attention to DCI really hear the foreign elements, and how much they don't fit.

Just my 2 cents.

[DrumcorpsmademeaTuba]

My only real issue at times with judging is that difficulty in design is less rewarded than it can and should be. The bigger problem is as a singular person, I have no idea how to fix this in anything resembling a fair way. The system isn't perfect, but what it is right now is too good for me to legitimately think that my opinions will improve it.

In terms of classes, there's not much I think should or can be changed, but in a way, it does bother me that there can be corps that dominate Open Class from year to year while there are World Class corps that run the bottom every year and sometimes don't even make the not-so-new-anymore 25 corps Semifinals. I don't think DCI should be forcing any corps to drop or go up a Class any time ever, (Full on European football style.) but it saddens me that this situation exists for years at a time with specific corps.

Edited July 15, 2013 by DrumcorpsmademeaTuba

[13strokeroll]

Make more shows like Allentown. Create a carnival-like atmosphere where scores almost become an afterthought.