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Official DCI Semifinals Thread 2015


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How soon we forgot. Just last year, late in the season, Cadets added huge banners at the end of their show, not once, but twice: first, the huge portraits of "typical Americans". And second, for the championships, they tossed up a huge backfield scrim of the U.S. Capitol. One could say, in fact, that is was a banner year for them.

This salmagundi (look it up) design approach did them no good last year, as the banners were not especially integrated into the theme of the show. Frankly, it had the air of desperation.

Cadets have done something similar this year, in their obsessive, nay, neurotic reliance on "10" as a thematic and dramatic element. They have thrown in more and more "10" related items, so that the show has become a kind of "Where's Waldo?" style scavenger hunt (oh hey, neon is number 10 on the periodic table!) instead of a cohesive and meaningful artistic statement. Paint by numbers, anyone?

So, yes, using your own standards, the Cadets have indeed taken "the easy way", at least in terms of visual integrity.

If furnishing giant scrims and brand new custom uniforms is the "easy way out," I would sincerely hate to hear your hard way. I won't argue the artistic merits of the scrims or uniforms other than to say art = subjective: what one person finds as "air of desperation," another may find "cohesive art from music-drill-guard-props." Cadets had a concept in the early design stages of this show in 2015, and they are sticking with it. I think the obvious "easy way out" or "air of desperation" would be for them to pull out their traditional maroon & cream uniforms tonight in hopes that abandoning their design concepts on the last night of the year in hopes to gain a few extra tenths in effect or visual.

Folks can crucify Hopkins for his ideas or philosophies, but I don't think anyone can logically argue that he's ever taken the "easy way out" in anything he's ever done in regards to The Cadets.

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oops, wrong thread.

Edited by war eagle
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