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Scores..."where everything is made up and the points don't mat


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I wonder if it is different now rather than BITD, because back then we were all on the field at retreat, heard the scores, exited in reverse order of score, etc? Now, unless they are the encore corps, they are on the busses and down the road before the scores are announced.

Not nearly as 'in your face' today as back then.

Edited by IllianaLancerContra
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I wonder if it is different now rather than BITD, because back then we were all on the field at retreat, heard the scores, exited in reverse order of score, etc? Now, unless they are the encore corps, they are on the busses and down the road before the scores are announced.

Not nearly as 'in your face' today as back then.

I think it is kinda different..as much as I hated retreats it was exciting to hear each corps called and who beat who on a given night and the anticipation. Many times on the bus someone now will ask.....what happened and you get an O and everyone goes back to sleep.or texting..ughhh..a sad difference but the way corps travel now there isnt much of a choice i guess

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Reasons to not care about score in no particular order:

There is no defense in drum corps. Worry about what you can control, let everyone else do their thing and don't worry about.

The number of points gained/lost in critique is outrageous. Can't count the times where we go in after getting dogged, go in and "educate" the judge, and the next night we're up by a point.

Lots of judges are bad at numbers management. Also can't count the number of times where we were beaten in a sub caption by someone we were clearly better than in that area, beating them handily all year. Went into critique and judge says "yeah, sorry, don't worry about that, just a numbers management thing"

AWFUL reads. Judge keeps getting kicked out of forms, misses half the ballad trying to get up front, half the closer trying to get back with the drums, and bails to the back sideline for the last 20 seconds. Then bombs you on the content side. Plenty of content, but he didn't see any of it because he wasn't doing his job!

Captain Cross Captions. Lots of times you pop in the Music GE tape (mp3...whatever), and halfway through you start over and make sure it's not the Music Analysis tape! Judging purely on execution of technical challenges, not even mentioning content, let alone any effect comments.

There are a lot of under qualified judges out there. The majority are great, but there is a sizable minority I wouldn't want judging my high school. Very shallow comments that grandma could make (watch the timing, play together), using large words (incorrectly) to try and sound smart. You go into critique and tell them about some of your depth, and on the next tape they talk about only the things you talked about.

These are from my experiences teaching top 12 World class the past three years.

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There are a lot of under qualified judges out there. The majority are great, but there is a sizable minority I wouldn't want judging my high school. Very shallow comments that grandma could make (watch the timing, play together), using large words (incorrectly) to try and sound smart. You go into critique and tell them about some of your depth, and on the next tape they talk about only the things you talked about.

Is Jeff Prosperie 'under qualified'? I think not! Is Albert Lo 'under qualified'? I think not! Is Lee Carlson 'under qualified'? I think not! Hmmm... I wonder then who, in your opinion, is 'under qualified'?

Edited by Stu
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Reasons to not care about score in no particular order:

There is no defense in drum corps. Worry about what you can control, let everyone else do their thing and don't worry about.

The number of points gained/lost in critique is outrageous. Can't count the times where we go in after getting dogged, go in and "educate" the judge, and the next night we're up by a point.

Lots of judges are bad at numbers management. Also can't count the number of times where we were beaten in a sub caption by someone we were clearly better than in that area, beating them handily all year. Went into critique and judge says "yeah, sorry, don't worry about that, just a numbers management thing"

AWFUL reads. Judge keeps getting kicked out of forms, misses half the ballad trying to get up front, half the closer trying to get back with the drums, and bails to the back sideline for the last 20 seconds. Then bombs you on the content side. Plenty of content, but he didn't see any of it because he wasn't doing his job!

Captain Cross Captions. Lots of times you pop in the Music GE tape (mp3...whatever), and halfway through you start over and make sure it's not the Music Analysis tape! Judging purely on execution of technical challenges, not even mentioning content, let alone any effect comments.

There are a lot of under qualified judges out there. The majority are great, but there is a sizable minority I wouldn't want judging my high school. Very shallow comments that grandma could make (watch the timing, play together), using large words (incorrectly) to try and sound smart. You go into critique and tell them about some of your depth, and on the next tape they talk about only the things you talked about.

These are from my experiences teaching top 12 World class the past three years.

Well, i think we can all agree that this is quite an indictment of the current DCI judging community. If true... and I have no reason to believe your depiction of the judging community is inaccurate, what do you believe needs to be done to improve this inadequate system where you believe " a sizeable minority of judges " are as unqualified as " grandma " ?

Edited by BRASSO
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It seems every year there are less and less judges. There are various reasons for this, but they aren't really important. This leads to two things: An aging judging community, and less qualified candidates being accepted.

By my unofficial count we lost 3 of the better judges this year because they are teaching corps now. I think there are a ton of younger amazing band directors who marched that would be great judges, and there should be an effort to recruit and train them.

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Well, i think we can all agree that this is quite an indictment of the current DCI judging community. If true... and I have no reason to believe your depiction of the judging community is inaccurate, what do you believe needs to be done to improve this inadequate system where you believe " a sizeable minority of judges " are as unqualified as " grandma " ?

Ummmm... Grandma agrees with the artistic bent of MGC so by definition she is certainly qualified; it is Grandpa who is apparently the under qualified curmudgeon.

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I'll give my 2 cents on this topic.

Yes we cared about scores along the way, we just wanted to see how we were improving. It wasn't anything super serious, it was just that we had something that could help motivate us along the way, it was very positive stimulation being able to see how we were doing.

Though we put all our trust into the staff to lead us into the right direction, we knew that there was only so much they could do, and the biggest thing that we could do to bump our scores was to just perform what we practiced. The staff does their part every day, and we have to do ours. If we just did that, our scores would bump. If not, we would instantly see and we could be thinking about how to become better performers in the next rehearsal blocks that we could use to translate over to a better performance at the next show. The scores didn't necessarily change how we acted, but gave us a little push. Some people cared, some didn't. Either way, we all worked towards the same goal, being the absolute best we could be; that never changed.

And for the record, I don't remember our finals scores, all I remember is the amazing summer I had flashing before my eyes as I walked out of the exit tunnel after the last performance of the season.

THAT is why kids march drum corps.

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