San Antonio Regional

[quietcity]

Can confirm. I owned a $3,000 Bose system. Total mid-only.

$3000 on a Bose system?? This makes me weep. Good god, for that kind of dough, you could have had such an amazing little set-up.

[geluf]

Never tell an audio/visual enthusiast what you intend to buy.

They will tell you you're doing it wrong.

[kaseyW]

This is my review:

Blue Devils: Very entertaining show with a great design concept. This design team is quite amazing.

Cadets: I hate to say this, but personally, Cadets are one of my least favorite this year. Corps is great as usual, but the design is pretty cheesy, and the music is very over played.

Bluecoats: This show absolutely thrills me. So many GE moments and a very great hornline. This is probably the best Bluecoats corps ever.

Santa Clara Vanguard: The loudest corps this year (even without the trombones). Everything is very well executed, and the drill is eye catching. I'd still take the 2004 show over this one though.

Carolina Crown: Though this show is very similar to the last two, I can't help but love Crown's hornline. Amazing book, and they are nailing it. I just wish the guard and drumline was at that par, but they wouldn't be fair.

Cavaliers: It's taken me a long time to adjust to the "new" Cavaliers, but this show has made me a Cavies fan again. The design isn't as eye catching as the Michael Gaines era, but it's still a great production. The drumline and the visual package is still one of the best attributes of the Cavaliers.

Phantom Regiment: I feel like this is a top 5 hornline, and the uniform changes are awesome and capture Black Swan perfectly.

Blue Knights: Seeing how this corps is my alumni corps, I can't help but be proud of them. This show is one of the most emotionally engaging productions in a while. The fact that people are crying from this show means they're doing well. I hope they place 7th this year.

Boston Crusaders: Maybe if I read "Animal Farm" I'd appreciate/understand this show better.

Blue Stars: Enjoyed their show, and their idea with the show. Interesting concept and props.

Madison Scouts: Love this show - especially the music. Not to mention, they have some excellent screamers.

Crossmen: Crossmen are hit and miss with me, and unfortunately this show is a miss for me.

Troopers: I enjoyed this show so much, and I hope that they make it into finals.

Spirit of Atlanta: One of my favorite shows of the night. The trumpet soloist wins the award for best screamer in my opinion.

[brichtimp]

I will get crucified for this, but IMHO the pyramid of sound is a load of horse ####. There are so many various styles of music and so much interpretation that placing a blanket rule over balance is quite honestly ridiculous. On a lead chart in jazz band do you want to hear nothing but bari sax/bone and bass? Do rotating woodwind parts sound better with bass clarinets and bassoons honking away like a wounded walrus? There is so much more to great ensemble playing than the pyramid of sound and every terrible player and band director I've ever known swears by it. That being said, do I love it when I hear shrill trumpets over a muddy low brass? HELL NO, but there are more problems with tone quality, intonation, and chord spelling in the writing that leads to these problems rather than an overall awareness of a pyramid shape to a chord. A perfectly pyramid brass ensemble will sound god awful if the tone qualities are not resonant and blended. I know this will come as a surprise to some know it all's out there, but two brass instruments perfectly in tune can be out of tone and lead to fuzz in the clarity of the sound. A perfect pyramid chord can sound out of balance depending on the spelling of the chord and which instruments emphasize which note in the chord and in which respective register.

Crucify me all you want, but I have spent the majority of my education and professional career sucking and listening to things that suck and one of my biggest pet peeves is the length to which terrible musicians will leap to defend the pyramid of sound. There, I said it, have at it critic buzzards hovering over the carcass of DCP.

Gene Pokorny is a 'terrible musician?' Yikes!

[brichtimp]

Cadets is pyramid? They sound more like a pair of Bose speakers to me, and always have. Devils have a fantastic low brass sound...it's just not super-heavy like PR usually is.

I want to hear a balanced sound, built upon sufficient low end to produce a solid foundation to a chord....not muddy nor overbearing, but audible. Bose speakers are even mediocre in their mid-range quality; and even those fabled 901s were low range deficient. And, I want to hear a little more low end in the Cadets' sound.....their rich mid range is a strength, IMHO.

Edited July 21, 2014 by brichtimp

[luv4corps]

I have to chime in here... to make a comparison.

I'm a music educator, though admittedly not in band. I have done a lot of vocal, choral, elementary, pop/rock band performing and teahcing, as well as arranging and composing. I know a good blend and balance when I hear it. I also know good voice leading when I hear it.

I can relate to this overuse of the pyramid methaphor for blending/balancing the brass. Untrained singers often say, "grab the third" when putting harmonies together... as if the 'third' magically stayed one chord tone above a melody composed purely of tonic scale tones throughout. I want to laugh - or punch them. Chord tones of course weave around and good voice leading means dressing up the melody in a way that makes the most sense when considering instrumentation, texture, etc. Certain scale tones should not be doubled or even emphasized - like thirds. So if you had, say, a third in the tubas or euphs, a 'pyramid' model would sound out of balance - and downright awful if the mellos or trumpets were also playing one. A good composer/arranger would never double a third like that though.

Theory 101.

Edited July 24, 2014 by luv4corps

[jwillis35]

Loving all the discussion on the "Pyramid" approach to sound, blend, and balance. Allow me to add a few things:

1. The pyramid system (as someone put it, a metaphor for bottom-up balance [ think mixing board ] ) is a good solid way to teach basics when it comes to balance and quality of sound.

2. But the pyramid structure, in professional music application and performance, must be altered to allow for style, orchestration, instrumentation, density, transparency, solo passages, composer preference, performance techniques, and much more.

Example [JAZZ]: There are many types of jazz. Bebop, swing, blues, Cool, avante guard, and a variety of hybrids like the fusion of rock and jazz, or jazz and latin. The sound established by the swing bands (especially Basie and Ellington) were based on rhythm section and lead trumpet and sax. The rhythm section played the key role in ensemble balance, with the lead trumpet being the most important wind instrument.

Most ensemble writing, especially when moving more quickly in swing fashion, was built on top-down voicing of 7 chords. The highest voice was the predominant voice. It could be lead alto sax (or clarinet as with Glenn Miller), or lead t-bone or trumpet. The concept was to NOT have the bottom voices overbalance the lead, and in most cases the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th parts were often still written out of the range of the string bass. The idea was that there had to be a gap between the lowest wind voices and the bass so the walking bass line could be heard, yet light and bouncy (not thick and deep). When bottom-up Open Voicing principles are used (often during slower passages, ballads), it takes great skill to manage instruments like bass trombone and baritone sax along with the string bass. Clutter at the bottom kills jazz, and the top voices almost always drive the sound.

*The Blue Devils are the quintessential JAZZ sound on the field, even when their shows are not all about jazz. Their balances are perfect to my ear, and in large part because they are NOT pyramid, at least not all the time. Sure, there are times in jazz ballads where the pyramid sound is most welcome. Balances with professional ensembles are always changing and shifting...never the same. Other corps have played jazz or jazz-like charts over the years, but NONE get the sound BD does. Wayne's arranging is faithful to true jazz orchestration. It's how I would envision the orchestrations when I play with professional jazz orchestras. Lots of top-down voicing, linear jazz writing, lots of unison and octave writing with rhythm section driving the groove (very difficult to pull off), and tons of range incorporated in the parts. More so than any other corps. Wayne writes for the BD baritones much like a trombone section in a pro-level jazz band. Lots of high parts that help to reinforce trumpets with mellos playing counter lines or also doubling. BD incorporates more key changes and style changes than any other corps as well...and tons of chromaticism. These are the things the judges hear that the average ear probably doesn't.

Most people hear Crown play beautiful chords and lots of fast runs and think "now that is demand." And it is, but most of the stuff Crown plays falls in the "sweet" spot. In other words, the notes are typically in the middle range and in keys that work well with the instruments (Bb, F). Crown's music is demanding, make no mistake, but no more demanding than what BD is doing, and often times much less. Go listen to The Cadets book from 1997. Crown is NOT playing anything more demanding than that. FACT!! But you have to do your research. And the Blue Devils books of 2010, 2003, 1999, 1994, 1993, 1991, 1988, or 86, or 84, or 82 are just MONSTERS. You cannot be a crappy brass player and make those lines.

Would I want BD to have a pyramid sound all the time? NO WAY. It would sound as if they do not know jazz. I hear too many drum corps try to do jazz and sound "thuddy" with a lack of focus to the lead lines. Too many poor arrangers out there, and most do NOT know how to score jazz correctly, so most corps avoid true jazz. Sadly BD themselves have not done it often enough for my taste, but they do incorporate the orchestration necessary for that sound, one that also works well with rock, latin, salsa, and other popular types.

The jazz thing is just one example. There are many others. The key is that balances must change, shift, and morph throughout a composition. The Cadets do this extremely well with their American style of music (Bernstein, Copland, Barber). They get it, and Jay knows how to orchestrate. Each section of the corps knows their role in terms of balance and blend.

Pyramid is great for school bands and orchestras, but as students get older and better they must learn of the more intricate methods to balance, blend, articulation, tonality, and style.

[TexasPRfan]

Just posted a review of all the corps from Saturday in the Review Section.

Harvey

[Triple Forte]

Most people hear Crown play beautiful chords and lots of fast runs and think "now that is demand." And it is, but most of the stuff Crown plays falls in the "sweet" spot. In other words, the notes are typically in the middle range and in keys that work well with the instruments (Bb, F). Crown's music is demanding, make no mistake, but no more demanding than what BD is doing, and often times much less.

Disagree with your assessment on Crown's brass music/arrangements. Getting 80 - 84 brass players to play the type of rhythmic passages and fast runs that they are playing (Most often spread across many yards) together is incredibly demanding. They have done this better than pretty much everyone else. For the individual player/part most drum corps music is not incredibly hard. In drum corps the challenging part is getting everything in unison while moving. That is the hard part. Just my opinion.

[BozzlyB]

Set of Polk audio book shelves with a sub. #### good sound for a tight budget.