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Segmentation: How DCI Has Gotten More Complicated... And Less Difficult


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One of my favorite shows is Boston. They have done a stellar concept, with so much variation, and with great performances.

BUT, look at that football field. They literally have stages set up all over the place. Look at how much time and energy is (wisely) spent at redirecting your vision to the different stages. They do it masterfully! But, the down side is, you aren't going to be doing much ensemble-wide performances with six static stages set up all over the field. The big moment at the end happens stage left. So too bad if you unknowingly purchased tickets stage right!

Bluecoats worked really hard to find ways to do both solo and ensemble design and performance, but in the end their stage concept ended up literally standing in the way of most ideas. The result is what we got, which was single file movements through the stage, and split field performances that struggled with sync and phasing. 

Crown stuck to their knitting and just did one big stage in the middle of the field. As a result, they could design and execute their traditional corps wide movements and ensemble music. No surprise they are going to win brass and maybe visual proficiency. But, they aren't going to compete for the gold.

If dci insists on sheets that value musical proficiency over ensemble wide performance, we are going to see more shows like Cavaliers and Madison, where with all due respect, absurdly overvalue staging and individualized moments at the expense of music and ensemble design.

Edited by MikeRapp
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9 hours ago, Stu said:

While there have been a few great musical moments as of late, in this culture of ADD Instant Visual Gratification you can forget about any real design focus shifting more toward music-melodic development.

Yep. No melody in the Blue Devils show this year. Nope. None.

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23 hours ago, SuncoastCrown said:

Nice well constructed and illuminating argument.  I feel like I understand much of the bickering on DCP now a little better.  The really big question is whether or not there is a solution that would fix those issues and make DCI stronger.  I for one, am interested in hearing possible solutions, but I also wonder how many agree that these are issues that need to be fixed.  Any ideas?

 

22 hours ago, Cadevilina Crown said:

This. Apparently now the Analysis judges seem to only care about the variety of things that corps do, not the balance between different elements of the music and visual book. Just look at BD and Crown this year. BD is winning Visual Analysis because they have a larger variety of things they do visually than anyone else, and Crown is winning Music Analysis because they have more variety in their music book than anyone else. It has hardly anything to do with performance or simultaneous demand. I think they need to separate the Analysis captions from the rest of the Visual and Music captions, call both of them "Ensemble Analysis" without naming either Music or Visual (similar to the changes to GE in 2014) and have one judge with a music focus and one with a visual focus.

Honestly, this is where my mind has been heading in regards to the future of the activity, and in particular its judging. Down Side Up in 2016 and the numerous response shows and incorporation of Bluecoats elements into design, IMO, helped lock in where the next paradigm shift in drum corps was going: the true diversification of visual identity through design. 

If you took a recording of Finals from the late 70's, put every corps in the same plain uniform, and muted the volume, how many corps would you be able to recognize based on visual alone? Probably few, if any. Do the same thing in 1995, sans any sort of prop. A few points may stick out, but there's still a pretty established basic set of elements that EVERY corps used, and the distinctions between corps are still few and far between. The identity of the corps was primarily based on the music and the uniform of the corps.

In 2017, the book of visual vocabulary has grown so large that a corps can't possibly squeeze all of these elements into a single show. The result? Corps pick and choose their elements, design their shows with them to the best of their abilities, and put them out on the field to be judged. You could put BD in Bloo's outfits, and yet from their design you would still recognize them as BD. You could put Bloo in Crown's uniforms and still recognize them as the Bluecoats. The identity of a drum corps is no longer in the uniform, but in the visual (and to a slightly lesser degree, the musical) design package a corps puts out.

At this time, judging still favors certain elements over others, and also favors simply showing as many visual elements as possible in a 11.5 minute period. The future, on the other hand, will need judging that does not ask "How much" a corps in implementing or "what kind," but rather simply, "How well are you utilizing the elements you have chosen to use?" No visual element is greater than any other, it simply comes down to how it is used in the show. Not only will that allow for corps to build and maintain a modern identity, but it may also open the door for more parity throughout the ranks of DCI. 

IDK, just my thoughts on the matter. 

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10 minutes ago, Everyfan said:

This is a whole lotta text just to say "I'm. Mad that BD is going to win again." Haters gotta hate.

Whatever. If you have something to add to our discussion, add it. Don't be that guy.

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3 minutes ago, MikeRapp said:

Whatever. If you have something to add to our discussion, add it. Don't be that guy.

Whatever. This is a thread intended to bash BD. Nothing else. To be honest, most of the top corps move and play about the same amount of time. BD just does it better and with more variety. Some, like the OP appear to be ###### that Crown is not winning.

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8 minutes ago, Everyfan said:

Whatever. This is a thread intended to bash BD. Nothing else. To be honest, most of the top corps move and play about the same amount of time. BD just does it better and with more variety. Some, like the OP appear to be ###### that Crown is not winning.

Then here's an idea, spend all your time in the Blue Devils thread, where there are little more than glowing gushing posts about Blue Devils. Just don't mix with the great unwashed. 

Some of us love the activity more than any one corps, and that's why we come here to discuss the activity. Whichever corps wins the gold will get most of the criticism and analysis. 

Edited by MikeRapp
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25 minutes ago, Everyfan said:

This is a whole lotta text just to say "I'm mad that BD is going to win again." Haters gotta hate.

No, it's not about that at all.  It's about poor, self-indulgent design choices, and those are by no means limited to BD.

I mean, as far as I'm concerned, NO ONE is winning anymore.  Someone above made the comparison with Michael Bay, and that's precisely what I feel like this activity has become; the musical equivalent of a Transformers film.  Sure it's going to sell a lot of tickets and make a lot of money, but it's also going to be universally panned by critics and have zero cultural relevance in future.

But you're right in one aspect.  Haters ARE gonna hate.  And I'm not ashamed to say I HATE what drum corps has devolved into.

Edited by Bobby L. Collins
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1 minute ago, Bobby L. Collins said:

No, it's not about that at all.  It's about poor, self-indulgent design choices, and they're by no means limited to BD.

I mean, as far as I'm concerned, NO ONE is winning anymore.  Someone above made the comparison with Michael Bay, and that's precisely what I feel like this activity has become; the musical equivalent of a Transformers film.  Sure it's going to sell a lot of tickets and make a lot of money, but it's also going to be universally panned by critics and have zero cultural relevance in future.

But you're right in one aspect.  Haters ARE gonna hate.  And I'm not ashamed to say I HATE what drum corps has devolved into.

There are many aspects that I love. 

There are a few that really concern me.

And a few that I truly hate.

We do have tremendous diversity right now. But individualism has come at the expense of unified corps wide designs. It's become almost impossible to medal doing shows that emphasize full ensemble performances.

i said this earlier, I am really happy that Scouts is back in the finals, but two of the greatest corps in the history of the activity -- Scouts and Cavaliers -- have two of what I consider to be the worst offenders of individualized expression over ensemble wide design and performance. These two shows are, for me, unwatchable from a musical performance standpoint. I could hardly even identify the music in these shows. If other corps look at these two designs and use them as examples of how to get back into the it crowd, I'm going to really hate the near future of dci.

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1 minute ago, MikeRapp said:

There are many aspects that I love. 

There are a few that really concern me.

And a few that I truly hate.

We do have tremendous diversity right now. But individualism has come at the expense of unified corps wide designs. It's become almost impossible to medal doing shows that emphasize full ensemble performances.

i said this earlier, I am really happy that Scouts is back in the finals, but two of the greatest corps in the history of the activity -- Scouts and Cavaliers -- have two of what I consider to be the worst offenders of individualized expression over ensemble wide design and performance. These two shows are, for me, unwatchable from a musical performance standpoint. I could hardly even identify the music in these shows. If other corps look at these two designs and use them as examples of how to get back into the it crowd, I'm going to really hate the near future of dci.

You do a terrific job of saying what I'm actually trying to say, but much more diplomatically.

I just wish DCI would stop pandering to art critics who aren't even in attendance.

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I think this all comes down to the old "art reflects culture" discussion. 

Generally speaking, so much of what exists as entertainment in our world today is short on depth. Consequently, the world of DCI has followed suit. It has to to stay relevant as an artistic medium.

But I agree with all the folks that are concerned about where the activity is right now. 

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