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The direction of show design: will all follow Bloo?


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they've changed the activity.

they have to practice in pants -- THE WHOLE SUMMER !

now THAT aint drumcorps :tic:

And that is absolutely true. The color guard does practice in white pants out of necessity!

Edited by Jurassic Lancer
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I loved the Bluecoats show last nite, absolutely LOVED it.. including their costuming. I have little doubt that it will have enormous influence in the Marching Band activity, especially the Scholastic Marching Band activity, where uniforms will not have to be purchased that can be very expensive. These costumes, that can fit the yearly themes, can easily be financially disposed of after each season now too. Are the 2016 Bluecoats a " Drum & Bugle Corps ", no, of course not. ( lets not be delusional here) .It is a fabulous cirque du soleil musical unit. This is both respectful to the former Drum & Bugle Corps genre, as well as respectful to this unit's new and exciting foray into the Marching Arts realm on the part of the Bluecoats. No doubt many others will mimic similar to this in future years, now that the Bluecoats can be expected to become successful with it, and conceivably win a title with this fantastic show of theirs, imo.

Edited by BRASSO
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One thing I can say about the costumes ... The bright white and yellow popped against the green field turf and red props. Juxtapose this against Crown's gorgeous but earth toned unis which I felt blended into the field.

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We all wondered the same thing about the early 2000's Cavaliers:

Will everyone play original music?

We all asked the same questions after 2005 Cadets:

Will everyone do drum speak?

We all asked the same questions after 2008 BD:

Will everyone move towards abstraction?

Same as it ever was.

The answer is: not unless upstairs rewards it. They did, so expect more of WGI to come. To be honest, I thought the slides and "half pipes" were under-utilized.

If it were me, I'd be going for broke with the gimmick: go even bigger and end the show by putting a massive slide together with a company front "sliding" (downside up) down.

Noob question, what is drum speak?
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Noob question, what is drum speak?

THE most horrifying thing you will ever hear in a drum corps show. Well, maybe.

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As much as I love this show, I do not think that this type of show will become the norm. The Bluecoats are making an artistic statement, for a very specific reason, with a very specific motivation. They are not trying to radically alter the activity as a whole, but rather to alter what is accepted as a "good" approach to show design in general. Which is to say, they want to break the limits of show structure, musical selection, visual design, etc, but are not prescribing this specific method for what should be replicated in the future. It's the same thing with the pitch bend; it was amazing and revolutionary when they did it, since they were the first ones, but anyone who does anything like that again will never have as much success as they did, even if it's them. This is the kind of show that can only be done once.

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Honestly, what I think of when I think of drum corps is power, strength. These Bluecoats uniforms do NOT radiate power or strength to me, at all. If I were a middle school or high school band student, and saw the Bluecoats in uniform, there is no way I could ever think "wow, those guys look cool, I wish I could join them". Just a thought.

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. . .I am anxious to see how far they can push this "drum corps wise", though, to get it away from the WGI stigma.

There's a chance to play with the dimensions; having a few of the slides and ramps the same color as the field (roughly, or in the case of Indy, you know what color to approximate) complete with "upside-down" yard markers and numbers would make for some interesting visuals.

Hell, borrow from the Cavaliers tenors a few years ago . . .get some folks to sufficiently camouflage themselves to hold the soloist upside down while on said ramps.

Or, make people disappear from one slide and reappear on another . . .

Lots to play with here.

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