ChuckH Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 (edited) It's a trade off between simplistic entertainment and the best interests of the musicians themselves. It is an academic institution, remember, and giving some real performing arts experience to the band members - with emotional subtlety and all - may just be more important to your school than pumping up the crowd in the standard way. The "corps style" college marching band would be a separate group from the band that plays at the football games. (There'd be overlap, of course.) It'd be a cooperative project between the music and dance departments, and performed once or twice a year (maybe on Friday to Sunday night runs) either on the soccer field or the lawn outside the dance building. The audience would be the friends of the performers, maybe parents if they live nearby, and the same collection of gray-haired couples in the community who come to every play and dance recital on campus. :-P Edited September 18, 2014 by ChuckH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornTeacher Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 It's a trade off between simplistic entertainment and the best interests of the musicians themselves. It is an academic institution, remember, and giving some real performing arts experience to the band members - with emotional subtlety and all - may just be more important to your school than pumping up the crowd in the standard way. From a life-long educator...Thank You. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornTeacher Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 Cool, that works for you. But that doesn't work for everyone. Some members want their college band to be really good, and perform a flashy show with actual drill. Others want the "normal college band" thing where it's just pop music and park-n-blow. Not sure you can really sum up the goal of college marching bands. Especially if it's a school where football isn't that big. fsu...as someone who has always found your posts both enlightening and germaine, I still have to ask... Is it now the primary role of the Marching Band to "pump up the crowd", just because "football just doesn't happen to be big at the given school?" If the school's football team isn't of quality, should the Marching Band equally share the blame for an inadequacy in the school's football program? VERY respectful question extended... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fsubone Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 fsu...as someone who has always found your posts both enlightening and germaine, I still have to ask... Is it now the primary role of the Marching Band to "pump up the crowd", just because "football just doesn't happen to be big at the given school?" If the school's football team isn't of quality, should the Marching Band equally share the blame for an inadequacy in the school's football program? VERY respectful question extended... My last sentence was more connected to programs that take college marching band very seriously, like Western Carolina. It seems as if most colleges consider their marching band as an extension of the spirit programs, who exists to support the athletics (read: football) teams, and pump up the crowd. This is usually what we see from most bands (i.e. Ohio State, Texas, Bama, Michigan). Shows full of modern tunes, very stereotypical drill, and crowd-friendly programming. There are programs though (mostly in the South) where the band is the draw, because the sports programs are not good. Bands like Grambling, Southern, Florida A&M, schools such as that. Their football programs are not known for being good at all, so the band show is what people come to watch. These are the big show bands. And the band should not bear any of the blame for the athletic program's inadequacies. They're not hiring the coaching staffs or recruiting players. They're showing up to play and entertain. There are also programs at all levels that run corps-style marching bands, and do take it seriously. It would appear most are at the lower levels of college sports, I can't think of any full corps-style bands at the FBS level. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cappybara Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 (edited) Big football school or not, the marching bands are performing at half time to give the audience entertainment. Not play a symphony. You can have tons of cool drill formations and STILL play pop music. It's not mutually exclusive. There are many more avenues for music students to get their performing arts education including concert/symphonic bands, recitals, etc. I'm no longer marching with my college band because I dont have time for it anymore nor do I enjoy playing pop music (I much prefer corps style) but that does not mean that the shows our band does are less educational for the members. Implying that is ridiculous. Edited September 18, 2014 by Cappybara 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornTeacher Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 I wasn't attempting to come across from an Ivory Tower (ultra-educational) perspective. My apologies it it seemed that way. It merely shows that my words were flawed, both in meaning and in formulation. FSU...thank you for your thoughtful response. It is much appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkHorner Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 Maybe we should start listing the ones we know here! It is the off season after all. Off the top of my head I can think of The University of North Alabama, Jacksonville State University, Western Carolina University, Riverside Community College, University of North Texas, and The University of Texas at Arlington (which as an anomaly is a college marching band without a football program). I would probably consider each of those to be relatively serious, "corps style" marching bands, but the level to which each would be "corps style" varies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Freedman Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 Big football school or not, the marching bands are performing at half time to give the audience entertainment. Not play a symphony. You can have tons of cool drill formations and STILL play pop music. It's not mutually exclusive. There are many more avenues for music students to get their performing arts education including concert/symphonic bands, recitals, etc. I'm no longer marching with my college band because I dont have time for it anymore nor do I enjoy playing pop music (I much prefer corps style) but that does not mean that the shows our band does are less educational for the members. Implying that is ridiculous. I haven't heard your band, but IMO the OSU band content is indeed much less educational than a corps-style experience. It's not that it's pop music - pop music has plenty of emotional range (maybe too much, sometimes). It's that OSU removes all the passion from it. It's all played in the same bouncy patriotic mood. Any of the original feeling I get listening to it comes from my associations, not from the band's expression. So from a GE perspective, ain't much learnin' goin' on. Some technique of course, but that's pretty basic. Any practice is good practice, but are you really pushing your limits of expression in a collegiate band? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brichtimp Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 I'd be pleased if the OSU band played their traditional French National Defile (dotting the 'I' drill) with the rhythmically correct dotted 8th and 16th note melodic line instead of making it sound like a 6/8 pattern. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cappybara Posted September 20, 2014 Share Posted September 20, 2014 I haven't heard your band, but IMO the OSU band content is indeed much less educational than a corps-style experience. It's not that it's pop music - pop music has plenty of emotional range (maybe too much, sometimes). It's that OSU removes all the passion from it. It's all played in the same bouncy patriotic mood. Any of the original feeling I get listening to it comes from my associations, not from the band's expression. So from a GE perspective, ain't much learnin' goin' on. Some technique of course, but that's pretty basic. Any practice is good practice, but are you really pushing your limits of expression in a collegiate band? I go to the University of Virginia. Judge the band for yourself on YouTube I guess haha. And that goes back to my point originally. Why does the marching band have to be educational per se? What's wrong with just entertaining the crowd? No one does that better than OSU. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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