Corps moving to Bb sopranos from trumpets

[Mello Dude]

Trumpet majors play a slew of different keys.

[UKSuperman]

Let me rephrase that and say 2 valve.

[ieuph7]

Phantom Regiment started the trend of dropping the baritone during the mid 2000's. BD did that after dropping Dynasty and went with Selmer/King in 2009. I suspect the King baritone is not that good so they didn't want to develop a new one.

Yes. Regiment went to all euphs in 2003, when they switched to Bb on King's new marching horns. We (Regiment hornline members) were consulted on design. IIRC, the switch to all euphoniums was brought on by JD Shaw watching 2002 SCV. I'm not completely sure, but either SCV had all euphs that year, or they had some very short/small of stature players on euph, and JD said something to the effect of "if they can march that horn, so can all of us." Those King marching euphs were crazy awesome to play. I don't think King's line started out having any baritones, and I too had heard that when they eventually made some they were not so great. Certainly nothing close to the awesomeness of their euph.

[Kamarag]

I stood in front of Raiders' brass arc at the Bayonne, NJ DCA show a few weeks ago, and was *very* impressed at the sound the Andalucia equipment produces, even given the corps' small compliment of 22 brass. The Bb soprano buigle sound was very evident, and I could hear the potential of what they might sound like with a larger line. The rest of the horns sounded very good as well.

[ieuph7]

No bashing here on Kanstul, but their Bb marching horns are OK. [...]

However,

They did not get the help on Bb since everyone left them in 1999. So their Bb horns were shorter versions of their G horns, except they couldn't make their Bb trumpet to work with the K20 G bugle bell, so they settled on the power bore bell, which is an new invention by itself during the late 1990's. The only horn in Bb from Kanstul that is still very G like, is their Tuba.

If you can find the following recordings, you will hear the difference between each generations.

1986 Blue Devils

1988 Madison Scouts

1991 Phantom Regiment

1992 Cavaliers

And fast forward to:

2001 Blue Devils

2002 Cavaliers

2003 Phantom Regiment

You will hear a huge difference in sound.

The best sounding Bb corps in my opinion is 2003 Phantom Regiment and 2004 Cavys. Seems like between 2005 to 2009, corps stop playing lyrics through brass, just ran around the field holding whole notes and let the percussion and pit do all the playing.

Quick question: did you intend to compare those corps/years between G (the older shows) and Bb (the newer shows) or between "generations" of instrument manufacturers? It reads to me like you mean the latter, but I thought 91 Regiment was a completely different manufacturer than 03 Regiment. Certainly Regiment 03 had completely different (sounding) horns from BD 01 and Cavies 02, by a different manufacturer. Or did I miss something in what you were trying to say? Also: thanks for the Regiment 03 compliment.

[ieuph7]

Back in the days a corps will hold on to their set of G bugles for around 5 years before buying a new set.

In 02 Regiment we had (at least in the Buick section) a crazy hodge-podge of horns from various years and of various makes, some were from as far back as 1992.

[84BDsop]

As for marketing strategy, I'm not going after any World Class corps at all. Yamaha, Jupiter and King got that covered by offering those groups free horns every year, or every other years. As a boutique company, I don't see the point of fighting the big guys. As stated, my goal is to supply DCA, high schools and colleges.

Similar to me in fencing...my niche is vending small, local events that never see an armorer, or one of the large vendors because it's not worth their money to come out.

I'll let them slug it out at the large national events.

[year1buick]

I had no idea that the term "soprano" (or "contra" for that matter) was anything more than a reference to where the instrument was voiced within the ensemble and had always assumed that difference in naming convention just came about because of the key change. Interesting.

[candl]

If bands are unable to use them, and they're not taught in schools, how do we expect to hear Drum Corps play them at the level that the Bb horns are? Sorry, but I think if we switched back to G's the level of the performances would be hindered.

Two different subjects: Diversity vs. quality of performance.

Same argument can be made for why bagpipe bands should switch to clarinets and saxophones.

Much better and accessible musically? Absolutely.

The end of bagpipe bands? Absolutely.

The need for clear diversity from band makes "two valves" more important to the future of drum corps than key or bore.

Edited August 26, 2016 by candl

[Liahona]

The biggest difference between the trumpet and soprano is the "wideness" of the sound.

This is VERY telling...I've started to really carefully listen for this...I'm surprised now what I hearing...actually a bit shocked in fact...explains a lot!