Someone Please Give Me A History Lesson

[elphaba01]

"Upsets BITD":

Something that you almost NEVER see in the rarefied air of todays DCI era are "Out of nowhere" upsets. BITD (Late 1950's & 1960's) they were part of the "Norm".

To mention but a few: To me, THE upset of the DECADE was the Racine Kiltie 'Out of Nowhere" win at 1964 VFW Nationals. They trounced the BEST from East & Mid West in both prelims and finals. Yeah, I know: "Tony Schlecta picked the winner". Kilts could not have been all that unworthy of the title as they stayed competitive for the remainder of the East Coast tour.

AND: They did it AGAN in 1968, and defended in 1969.

Some "Local" upsets that are well remembered included our cross town rivals (Bridgeport PAL Cadets) upset of the Boston Crusaders in 1964, the ONLY show Boston lost going into VFW Prelims, our other cross town rivals (St Raphaels Buccaneers) upset of St Kevins at the 1965 WO, the Racine Scouts HUGE upset of the "Best of the MidWest" in 1967, and St Patricks Cadets upsetting all the NJ heavyweights at the conclusion of the 1965 season.

I'm sure that there are more well remembered "Upsets" out there in dc cyberspace.

Please feel free to share.....

Elphaba

WWW

[HornsUp]

no one ever forced those "local" corps to take on the touring model.

No one forced them, but there WAS a rule on corps size. The DCI founders imposed a 135 member limit, the reasoning being that this was the capacity of 3 busses. After two seasons, this number was lowered to 128 for a couple of decades. (DCA had already imposed their 120 member limit.)

Now before DCA and DCI, there never was anything in the rulebooks about corps size. Many corps were one-bus-and-a-Uhaul corps. Many evolved, in the 60s, to be a two-bus-and-a-boxtruck corps.

Then all of a sudden, there was a number in the bluebook. Intended to limit growth, it was just large enough to have the opposite effect. Everybody reasoned that "if we want to be competitive" they had to field the maximum membership.

Well, you all know drumcorps, nobody ever aspired to be small. Everybody insisted on fielding a three-bus-and-a-semi unit. Even before they started thinking about a food truck.

Just read a bunch of historic posts, every PR release in the 70s promised a fullsized corps. But then every contest review counted noses, and nearly every corps fell short of their ambitions.

And 90% of them ultimately folded, trying to keep up with the Joneses.

Edited August 19, 2013 by HornsUp

[rayfallon]

No one forced them, but there WAS a rule on corps size. The DCI founders imposed a 135 member limit, the reasoning being that this was the capacity of 3 busses. After two seasons, this number was lowered to 128 for a couple of decades. (DCA had already imposed their 120 member limit.)

Now before DCA and DCI, there never was anything in the rulebooks about corps size. Many corps were one-bus-and-a-Uhaul corps. Many evolved, in the 60s, to be a two-bus-and-a-boxtruck corps.

Then all of a sudden, there was a number in the bluebook. Intended to limit growth, it was just large enough to have the opposite effect. Everybody reasoned that "if we want to be competitive" they had to field the maximum membership.

Well, you all know drumcorps, nobody ever aspired to be small. Everybody insisted on fielding a three-bus-and-a-semi unit. Even before they started thinking about a food truck.

Just read a bunch of historic posts, every PR release in the 70s promised a fullsized corps. But then every contest review counted noses, and nearly every corps fell short of their ambitions.

And 90% of them ultimately folded, trying to keep up with the Joneses.

Ya know Kenny - I would put this to you and/or Frank:

We bemoan the loss of all these smaller corps, including my own Oceanside Legionnaires (Okay, maybe just Jack Murray and I bemoan their loss) but honestly... had the world not attempted to keep up with the initial touring corps, Casper, Cavies, Royal Airs, how long would the smaller corps have ultimately lasted?

Would the Edison Saints still be around? The Norwood Imperials? The Bracken Cavaliers?

I know it's impossible to unring the bell to say for sure, but my own sense tells me that we were trending fewer way before we started to chase the big guys.

I missed a couple of really pivotal years being overseas between 1972 and 1974 but I'm skeptical about DCI wiping out the neighborhood corps. I think it was a meteor that hit in Mexico somewhere...

but that's just me...

[ironlips]

DCI didn't wipe out anybody. It was always intended to be (and still is) an association of the elite corps, dedicated to their own progress.

What is notable is how many of the others actually pushed their way into the group over the years. The other "local" groups disappeared because the Legion, VFW and church support groups declined drastically in membership and therefore could no longer support those corps. The basic infrastructure evaporated.

Our parents' generation put money and energy into this activity. Ours, by and large, did not. We didn't have as many kids for one thing. (OK. Ray Fallon did, but not the rest of us.) We didn't join the VFW. We left the church.

On the upside, many drum corps-trained folks moved into music education at the secondary level. Today's high school bands serve the very same populations that the neighborhood corps did years ago and, by and large, they do it more efficiently.

There is absolutely nothing that prevents anyone from starting a neighborhood corps right this minute in almost any town in the country. What you can't do is easily start a viable and competitive DCI or even DCA corps and get it on the field immediately. You can't build a house starting with the third floor.

The inner cities are crying out for such groups, just as they were in the old days. Who will step up?

[JimF-LowBari]

After reading the last few posts of people I might see next week or so at DCA might as well broaden the history lesson a bit. Lot of the corps were sponsored (and will let others describe how well the corps were sponsored) by groups that no longer exist or have declined. Lot were in the city and churches and other groups there have sadly declined since the 50s/60. <snipping personal experiences while on church council for city church> Also the AL and VFW membership has gone down greatly since the majority of the members were WWI (none left) and WWII vets. Simply put a lot of Posts no longer exist or the Post membership is down so much they cannot afford to sponsor too much.

For example: one of the mid-50s Champs was from my home town (Harrisburg, PA Privateers). Their home Post (VFW Aurand) folded about 10 years after the corps won. About 3 years back I found out by accident where the Post was in the city----> And not sure about the VFW Post that sponsored my old corps when they won in the 50s. Building I remember is gone....

Edited August 19, 2013 by JimF-LowBari

[rayfallon]

DCI didn't wipe out anybody. It was always intended to be (and still is) an association of the elite corps, dedicated to their own progress.

What is notable is how many of the others actually pushed their way into the group over the years. The other "local" groups disappeared because the Legion, VFW and church support groups declined drastically in membership and therefore could no longer support those corps. The basic infrastructure evaporated.

Our parents' generation put money and energy into this activity. Ours, by and large, did not. We didn't have as many kids for one thing. (OK. Ray Fallon did, but not the rest of us.) We didn't join the VFW. We left the church.

On the upside, many drum corps-trained folks moved into music education at the secondary level. Today's high school bands serve the very same populations that the neighborhood corps did years ago and, by and large, they do it more efficiently.

There is absolutely nothing that prevents anyone from starting a neighborhood corps right this minute in almost any town in the country. What you can't do is easily start a viable and competitive DCI or even DCA corps and get it on the field immediately. You can't build a house starting with the third floor.

The inner cities are crying out for such groups, just as they were in the old days. Who will step up?

One other weird thing about our generation is that we were so ###### off at our parents for leaving us to ride our bikes to baseball games, etc. that we now drive our kids to soccer (Yeesh - Soccer), Little League, Karate; Kung-Fu; and for the ice cream enriched Sumo lessons, swim team, gymnastics, dance lessons, and physical therapy for all the stress injuries from all these stupid activities.

I started doing drum corps at the age of 10 and did it for #@#**ing ever. My dad told me "if you had a show across the street and it was free I wouldn't go" (thanks Dad). He was an equal opportunity ignorer - he skipped my baseball and football games too. Sounds like criticism but that's the way the WWII generation were. You had a bike - you had a game - get on your bike and get to the game - and don't miss work (we all had weekend and after school jobs like McDonalds).

Most kids can't make their minds up about a committment like drum corps now, especially local drum corps. Their parents push them to play all the crap that they [the parents] never got to play, and they sit in the stands and scream at the coaches and officials. Frankly I prefer my dad's (lack of) involvement.

BTW years later when I was teaching Boston and I played a recording for dad he sort of approved. I said "if it was free and across the street would you go now?" He thought about it (for about 3 seconds) and said "No, but now I might sit on the porch and listen."

Not just different times - it's a different planet.

[Fran Haring]

People complained, and rightfully so, about the bugles - utter junk which occasionally got worse such as when DEG broke away from Getzen. Make your head hurt. If you played on a Smith horn in the early 70s you had the sense that they were embarrassed to put their real name on the instrument so named it like at a no-tell motel, the Mr and Mrs John Smith horn.

That's the thing that amazes me the most about the corps of that era... the sound generated by the big-time corps, and even many of the smaller local-circuit corps. (Of course, there also were corps, especially on the local level, that seemingly had no clue how to produce a decent sound. LOL)

Playing on what basically were tinker-toy instruments.... man, there was some good stuff coming out of those horn lines. All credit goes to the arrangers... like the great ones you mentioned, Ray... and of course, the players.

Edited August 20, 2013 by Fran Haring

[Ray Priester]

I have to agree with those who posted "This is the best thread EVER started here.

Having been a participant for too many years to recount, I also must add that this is the way it was and it was pretty good for so many kids and even young adults who seemingly had no way out of their local environment, good or bad.

As for staff back then, even the biggies had minimal instructors, one horn instructor/arranger, one drum instructor/arranger and one M&M instructor/ drill arranger. There was usually just one director and, if you were lucky, one trusted parent who would run the check book. That's it. There were some parents who would help out and for some of them, it was their first but not last exposure to drum corps. These are the folks who helped with fund raisers ( hey my junior corps had a $2000.00 budget back then), some sewed flags, uniforms and the repair thereof, and would help to transport some kids to rehearsals twice a week. The local corps were the ones to introduce a LOT of potential delinquents to music, discipline, comradery, focus and teamwork. In many cases, it was better than family, but a family unto itself! For some it was the only real family they ever knew and it saved them.

I'm certain that today's corps ( or bands) have the same experiences we did, but IMHO, we had it much better and without dancing/prancing, electronics, etc.. Any sound produced on the field or on the street was produced by US, not some console on the sidelines. For some reason, 27-36 horns did not need to be "enhanced" as much as 70-80 need today. Yeah, perhaps the instruments were crap and no one in the line could read music ( the little Xs and Os on the charts got them started though) and going to "States" was the big trip of the year, but I wouldn't have changed anything about the way we did it in the 50s/60s/70s. It was what it was and produced a hell of a lot of good people and some of the top instructors and professional musicians to be found today.

OK, back to my Fleetwood records now. Thanks for keeping this going. Good stuff.

Ray

[JimF-LowBari]

Playing on what basically were tinker-toy instruments....

My old term was "modified Army signal devices" And what was amazing how we got moving beautiful music out of those beasts..... right we before the rfl (real flippin' loud) started up.

Most amazing piece of music IMO in my collection of 50s shows is from my old corps (OK I'm biased ) from 1954. Single valve horns with lot less notes available to play and no voices lower than a tenor Bari. After the usual fanfare and march type music (including Hail To the Chief). Then the concert is "Bolero" played in a very soft for the era style and lot of different things going on within the voices. Everytime I hear it I have to remind myself the type of horns being used and it's older than I am (barely....).

No idea who the arranger was but.... and

Edited August 19, 2013 by JimF-LowBari

[rayfallon]

I have to agree with those who posted "This is the best thread EVER started here.

Having been a participant for too many years to recount, I also must add that this is the way it was and it was pretty good for so many kids and even young adults who seemingly had no way out of their local environment, good or bad.

As for staff back then, even the biggies had minimal instructors, one horn instructor/arranger, one drum instructor/arranger and one M&M instructor/ drill arranger. There was usually just one director and, if you were lucky, one trusted parent who would run the check book. That's it. There were some parents who would help out and for some of them, it was their first but not last exposure to drum corps. These are the folks who helped with fund raisers ( hey my junior corps had a $2000.00 budget back then), some sewed flags, uniforms and the repair thereof, and would help to transport some kids to rehearsals twice a week. The local corps were the ones to introduce a LOT of potential delinquents to music, discipline, comradery, focus and teamwork. In many cases, it was better than family, but a family unto itself! For some it was the only real family they ever knew and it saved them.

I'm certain that today's corps ( or bands) have the same experiences we did, but IMHO, we had it much better and without dancing/prancing, electronics, etc.. Any sound produced on the field or on the street was produced by US, not some console on the sidelines. For some reason, 27-36 horns did not need to be "enhanced" as much as 70-80 need today. Yeah, perhaps the instruments were crap and no one in the line could read music ( the little Xs and Os on the charts got them started though) and going to "States" was the big trip of the year, but I wouldn't have changed anything about the way we did it in the 50s/60s/70s. It was what it was and produced a hell of a lot of good people and some of the top instructors and professional musicians to be found today.

OK, back to my Fleetwood records now. Thanks for keeping this going. Good stuff.

Ray

You know Ray - one of the things I was reminded of reading your post was the fact that we had a total of very few degreed musicians teaching us, while every marching band in the Universe had at least one. They in turn admonished their playing members to avoid drum corps like the plague. Eventually a lot of us went and played with our school bands and blew them away - we were able to learn to read music in a few hours, but they were not able to train their ears the way ours had been trained. We could hear a melody many measures long and play it back note for note in the correct key. We could (especially if we were baritones) play the interior harmonies of songs correctly, like back-up singers in a doo-wop group. They were playing Souza. We were playing Guys and Dolls. They had instruments which had cost their parents 2 weeks pay. Our instruments took two weeks of hammering and bending before anyone could play them. They high-stepped, we head chopped. Their color guards guarded the colors. Ours heaved fairly authentic M1 replicas as much as 100 ft to another guard member who generally caught them. They held their ground while our staffs broke new ground, and by the early 70s we won. All of a sudden the term "corps style" bands emerged. And what emerged from there? Within a generation those drum corps kids had the degrees that our instructors never did and many of the best bands were taught by drum corps guys and girls, playing arrangements written by drum corps guys and girls.

It's almost like it was a guerilla war during the 60s - us playing on crap, learning by rote, being taught to march by former Army sergeants. They playing on top of the line legit instruments, reading charts, taught by Masters and Doctors of Music and Education.

And we won. Makes you sort of smile thinking about it.