Madison Scouts 2014 -- Playing the Music of Stan Kenton and Don Ellis

[Lincoln]

Wow. I'm a huge fan of Kenton. I'm also a Kenton purist. What Robert W.,. Smith wrote is criminal. And to think they actually paid him for that crap. :)

I had a different impression after listening. The first thing I thought was "Wow - Jazz!" and the second thing I thought was "The crowd is going to go crazy for this!"

The third thing I thought was that what I heard made me think back to when Madison just blew the stands down.

[Scerpella]

The more I watch those videos the more I am convinced this show is going to be blowing the stands down by mid July. The funny thing about complaints about how faithful (or unfaithful) arrangements are, is that if you are my age (57 in one week) and were pretty into Jazz when younger then you might actually prefer some of these takes vs the originals. As far as Don Ellis is concerned, his music was always out of the mainstream Jazz movement. I dont even understand why Bulgarian Bulge is even considered Jazz to be honest. I thought I was at a Greek wedding! Remember too that dress rehearsal videos of Crown were not very indiicative of what this show would become.

Disappointment regarding Fanfare for the New is understandable. The original version which was pretty faithfully followed by Argonne was pretty booty kicking, I'd say a song that was among the best in lending itself to our activity. But stop for a moment and imagine what would happen if they did stay faithful. Some of us dinosaurs would be happy, but then we'd be POed because the judging community would say "been done" and that would be that for GE.

As for the guy who said the book was easy, sorry but it is clear you are suffering from MDS (Madison Derangement Syndrome). The question is whether they will be able to play this difficult music with aplomb. On first viewing I would say signs point to yes.

Edited June 20, 2014 by Scerpella

[seen-it-all]

These marching shows are about creativity. If I wanted to hear a straight rendition of a song, I'd go ahead and listen to a symphony orchestra play it. Not a drum corps/marching show

It's not exactly that black and white an issue. Of course when an arranger "arranges" something, they must work it to fit the constraints of the activity. They trim phrases, they delete entire sections, they reorchestrate to fit their instrumentation, they search for the "essence" of the piece and try to make that work within the larger frame of the show they are arranging. Some arrangers are clearly better at this than others.

There are times, however, when their arranging actually does more damage than good, and the "essence" of what makes the piece what it is gets totally lost. There are also times when the arranger tries to cram some extraneous flourish and flair in order to beef up the technical demand and it just doesn't fit. Over-arranging happens, and far too often in DCI in my opinion. Especially with well-known pieces. When you take a well-known melody or piece of music and an arranger messes with it so much that you can barely recognize the melody anymore, THAT'S NOT BEING CREATIVE. You can most definitely "drumcorps-ize" an arrangement of a well-known piece of music and make it work, but the best arrangers know when to take liberties and be creative and when to get out of the way and let the original essence of the piece speak for itself.

Another possible contributor to these complaints could be how so many shows these days are pieced together like a collage. Some corps use source material from eight to ten (or MORE!) pieces of music. A show is only ten and a half minutes long. When you keep skipping from one source to the next without allowing melodies to breathe or develop, or without something larger to tie it all together, you wind up losing sense of what the music can really contribute. I like to think of it like this: I love action movies, and I love a good fight scene. Most times these days, fight scenes are shot with hand-held cameras and edited in a very quickly-paced manner, with an edit occurring every second or two. In trying to capture the energy and ferocity of what's taking place, this seems to make sense. However, sometimes that style is too fast and too chaotic. As an audience, we lose sense of geography, of which actor is which, of what exactly is going on in these obviously well-choreographed scenes. In the end, it's more confusing and often exhausting to watch (and not in a good way) than satisfying or exciting which is the intent.

In the most recent Bond movie, Skyfall, a fight takes place between Bond and an assassin on one of the upper floors of an enormous skyscraper in Shanghai. No hand-held cameras. No fast-paced editing. The entire sequence is filmed basically in one long shot with the actors fighting in silhouette as the camera slowly moves forward. In the background, reflections of the neon lights from nearby buildings frame the action. It's one of the most memorable, most gripping, and strangely most beautiful action sequences I've ever seen on film. THAT'S being creative.

For the record, I haven't heard Madison's show yet, so this is not really a critique of what they're doing. I'd be interested in hearing it because I'm a big Don Ellis fan, and with the kind of long phrases and complex meters and melodies he's famous for, it will quite easy for me to tell whether or not the arrangements honor the essence of those pieces or not. If it's as hacked up as some people are hinting at, I would be disappointed.

[Cappybara]

It's not exactly that black and white an issue. Of course when an arranger "arranges" something, they must work it to fit the constraints of the activity. They trim phrases, they delete entire sections, they reorchestrate to fit their instrumentation, they search for the "essence" of the piece and try to make that work within the larger frame of the show they are arranging. Some arrangers are clearly better at this than others.

There are times, however, when their arranging actually does more damage than good, and the "essence" of what makes the piece what it is gets totally lost. There are also times when the arranger tries to cram some extraneous flourish and flair in order to beef up the technical demand and it just doesn't fit. Over-arranging happens, and far too often in DCI in my opinion. Especially with well-known pieces. When you take a well-known melody or piece of music and an arranger messes with it so much that you can barely recognize the melody anymore, THAT'S NOT BEING CREATIVE. You can most definitely "drumcorps-ize" an arrangement of a well-known piece of music and make it work, but the best arrangers know when to take liberties and be creative and when to get out of the way and let the original essence of the piece speak for itself.

Another possible contributor to these complaints could be how so many shows these days are pieced together like a collage. Some corps use source material from eight to ten (or MORE!) pieces of music. A show is only ten and a half minutes long. When you keep skipping from one source to the next without allowing melodies to breathe or develop, or without something larger to tie it all together, you wind up losing sense of what the music can really contribute. I like to think of it like this: I love action movies, and I love a good fight scene. Most times these days, fight scenes are shot with hand-held cameras and edited in a very quickly-paced manner, with an edit occurring every second or two. In trying to capture the energy and ferocity of what's taking place, this seems to make sense. However, sometimes that style is too fast and too chaotic. As an audience, we lose sense of geography, of which actor is which, of what exactly is going on in these obviously well-choreographed scenes. In the end, it's more confusing and often exhausting to watch (and not in a good way) than satisfying or exciting which is the intent.

In the most recent Bond movie, Skyfall, a fight takes place between Bond and an assassin on one of the upper floors of an enormous skyscraper in Shanghai. No hand-held cameras. No fast-paced editing. The entire sequence is filmed basically in one long shot with the actors fighting in silhouette as the camera slowly moves forward. In the background, reflections of the neon lights from nearby buildings frame the action. It's one of the most memorable, most gripping, and strangely most beautiful action sequences I've ever seen on film. THAT'S being creative.

For the record, I haven't heard Madison's show yet, so this is not really a critique of what they're doing. I'd be interested in hearing it because I'm a big Don Ellis fan, and with the kind of long phrases and complex meters and melodies he's famous for, it will quite easy for me to tell whether or not the arrangements honor the essence of those pieces or not. If it's as hacked up as some people are hinting at, I would be disappointed.

It's only overarranging if you put yourself in the mindset "okay so this corps is going to play this song and it's going to sound like this." If you keep an open mind (and when I say an open mind, I actually mean an open mind) about the show and not try to self-arrange it in your head, the arrangement that the corps uses, no matter how changed it is from the original source, will sound good. Because it's drum corps and these members play at an insane level. It's one thing to not like the arrangement after the fact, but if you're expecting it to sound a certain way, you're going to be disappointed more often than not and you won't enjoy drum corps as much as you could.

[Nine White Russians]

I find it strange that there's always such craziness when it comes to Madison each year.... Like or don't like, they are always trying to please fans- which is cool. Gotta say though, all those years of "placement doesn't matter" seems to be list on some alum and big diehard fans! If you love the Scouts, what does it matter if someone doesn't care for their show? They'll always be well received and continue to push themselves and the activity. So far the Kenton/Ellis show for me seems a bit dry.... And I love both composers. But, I really want to see it and Madison without making too rash of judgement!

My crazy post had more to do with Frankbeme's cranky know-it-all attitude than anything else. If he doesn't like the Scouts' show,

that's perfectly fine, or he may not like the arrangement...also perfectly fine. It's his hilarious over the top response that I felt warranted

my own hilarious over the top response. ;)

[seen-it-all]

It's only overarranging if you put yourself in the mindset "okay so this corps is going to play this song and it's going to sound like this." If you keep an open mind (and when I say an open mind, I actually mean an open mind) about the show and not try to self-arrange it in your head, the arrangement that the corps uses, no matter how changed it is from the original source, will sound good. Because it's drum corps and these members play at an insane level. It's one thing to not like the arrangement after the fact, but if you're expecting it to sound a certain way, you're going to be disappointed more often than not and you won't enjoy drum corps as much as you could.

That's a pretty terrible way to evaluate music. Just have an open mind and no matter how it differs from the original piece, it will sound good? Sorry, that's not how I roll, and I am very willing to keep an open mind when interpreting drum corps performances as they relate to the original pieces of work. I think by and large drum corps arrangers have done a pretty respectable job at it over the years. It's not easy to conform this stuff to what we do, some of which comes from hours long works of music, to ten and a half minutes. I'm not, however, willing to just blindly accept everything I hear as being good.

[Cappybara]

That's a pretty terrible way to evaluate music. Just have an open mind and no matter how it differs from the original piece, it will sound good? Sorry, that's not how I roll, and I am very willing to keep an open mind when interpreting drum corps performances as they relate to the original pieces of work. I think by and large drum corps arrangers have done a pretty respectable job at it over the years. It's not easy to conform this stuff to what we do, some of which comes from hours long works of music, to ten and a half minutes. I'm not, however, willing to just blindly accept everything I hear as being good.

I'm not saying to blindly accept all music. I'm not a fan of rap music. There are certain arrangements I don't like. All I'm saying is that you shouldn't hate an arrangement just because it differs too much from an original arrangement.

[seen-it-all]

All I'm saying is that you shouldn't hate an arrangement just because it differs too much from an original arrangement.

Why not? We all bring our own personal tastes and even prejudices to these things, whether we like it or not. I could attempt to convince you that if you would just keep an open mind and understand the nature of what the Cadets uniform means and where it comes from and how it relates to the show they're doing this year, you should really like their uniform. And you will state, for whatever reason that holds meaning to you and how you evaluate these things, that the Cadets uniform is ugly and you hate it. And that's fine. Musically speaking, no two people have the same background or experience in listening to, or performing, or evaluating music. I don't hate all drum corps arrangements that differ from the source too much. But I can't just give myself a lobotomy and turn off my brain and ignore that which I know and love about a piece of music just so I can better appreciate what some drum corps or their arranger wants me to feel when listening to their show. As with all things, context matters. And if the arrangements detract from my own personal enjoyment of the show, then I reserve the right to dislike them and criticize them as I please.

[msesq]

GO SCOUTS!!

[madalumni]

Wow, there are some tricky tempos and articulation styles in this show. Some people don't seem to realize that varying time signatures, phrasing,

and highly exposed melodies can make a show very difficult. Try getting swing to line up on the backside of the beat when you've

got a moving form that spreads from 30 yd line to 30 yd line for example. Anyway, I think that this is the type of book (in all sections) that will make or break

them. If they can clean it, I think it could be a top 6 show. If not, they could be fighting off some great corps that are also gunning for those spots.

But that's a good thing. I love that this staff has confidence that the guys in the corps will rise to the occasion!