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2018 Tour Premiere


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Just now, pbeau said:

Drum corps at the theater still a distant second to seeing the corps live.

i'm taking 2 family members to their first live show this year

it's always so great seeing the looks on newbies' faces when they hear a top corps live

can't wait

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What a great night of drum corps. I wish I wasn't at work. And I wish I didn't have to go troubleshoot the freaking network.

 

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2 hours ago, N.E. Brigand said:

 I have a suggestion for DCI: every corps who is scheduled to perform in the premiere must make a high-camera videorecording of a full run of their show (or as much of it is then done) at least three days earlier and provide it, via some secure means, to Tom Blair so that he has an idea in advance of where to point the cameras.

Overall I was underwhelmed (although my mood may be affected by having been to the vet to have one of my cats put to sleep an hour earlier)

I believe the corps DO send him videos in advance and some performance notes...still not an easy task.  By the time he does finals he will have seen most of the corps LIVE several times.  Not so for the premiere.

Sorry to hear about your cat...that would affect my mood for sure too.

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Finally done debriefing my family (who won't be able to make live shows or theater this year) on what I saw, so now I can share thoughts here.

Blue Stars: I was right when I said that this show was going to be one I enjoyed listening to regardless of how it fared. The carpentry theme doesn't sell at all right now, and I'm not sure how to tweak that. But the music is good to listen to, and the guard spins and tosses things well. The big hit in "Close to You" needs a tweak, and the last movement is a take-or-leave, but...THAT OPENING THOUGH.

Best Phantom design since Turandot. Not sure if that's a tribute to this show or a comment on how poor the designs 2013-2017 were. Guard is already better in terms of material to work with than last year. Also shouts to Tom Blair and the backfield cameraman for showing us the conductor's face as she pulled the baton for the first time. That was the best smile I've seen all year and I hope they give her the video of that.

Boston: I really enjoy the first two thirds of the show. MARIMBA SPIRITUAL IS SO DOPE THOUGH. Spelling out the Conquest hits in Morse while playing the Conquest hits was amazing. Was that backflip Jesus in their guard this year? FIRE STILL PRETTY. The bad: Salvation is Created is a meh. Amazing Grace and Castaway, also meh. (Possibly related: I'm Jewish; the Christian religious texts, while well written, aren't my thing.) Uniforms are a no from me, but not as much of a no as others (will discuss below). The Lost/Found spell-out was...a bit much.

BLOOOOOOOO: They're wearing Coats again! Yay! I mentally edited the clove cigarettes into the pit's mouths even though they weren't there (they weren't actually there, right?). Not sure why chairs this year--they seem to be a bit of a random choice (or at least, don't serve as specific a thematic purpose as the ramps and the Line last year). Unis look good. Music was enjoyable in the moment but none of it's sticking with me currently. Singer was good! It's nice to hear Bluecoats doing jazz again, too.

Cavies: Much like I liked last year's show more 7 years ago when it was called XtraordinarY, I liked this show more eight years ago when it was called Madworld. The lack of white up top on the uniform hurts the visual read, or at least doesn't help the visual read as much as the white hats and shoulder wings used to help the visual read. Seriously, just a white hat would help. Singing--meh. Out-of-balance Lou Reed--also meh. But that's a good hornline, point blank (as opposed to a good hornline by Cavies standards). It'd be nice if they had a better design to work with.

Crown: the leaked uni photo was bad. Then the official reveal looked good. Now that we've seen them under the lights...back to bad. On the move, the tail looks like someone left the flap of their onesie open. The extra draped bits around the arms are bad, too. They feel cluttered visually, and I think the draped bits are part of the problem. Then again, they placed first in visual tonight, so what do I know? Brass is as good as ever. Percussion did not step back after last year. "If I Fall" was quite lovely. "Blow It Up, Start Again" was made for the Bluecoats and I'm sad we're not hearing them do it, but that piece is awesome and Crown does it well.

Summary: I'm about 90% certain the champion this year is coming from out west (up from my usual 60% sure when Vanguard isn't coming off a medal). I think the only two corps that we saw tonight that have a chance to jump up are Bloo and maybe Crown (once the rest of the show is on the field and they fix the visual). And I think this could be a year where the powers that be say "hey, none of the shows this year are that great, let's call the margins ever so slightly tighter to boost the competition aspect," a la 2015.

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Just now, ftwdrummer said:

Finally done debriefing my family (who won't be able to make live shows or theater this year) on what I saw, so now I can share thoughts here.

Blue Stars: I was right when I said that this show was going to be one I enjoyed listening to regardless of how it fared. The carpentry theme doesn't sell at all right now, and I'm not sure how to tweak that. But the music is good to listen to, and the guard spins and tosses things well. The big hit in "Close to You" needs a tweak, and the last movement is a take-or-leave, but...THAT OPENING THOUGH.

Best Phantom design since Turandot. Not sure if that's a tribute to this show or a comment on how poor the designs 2013-2017 were. Guard is already better in terms of material to work with than last year. Also shouts to Tom Blair and the backfield cameraman for showing us the conductor's face as she pulled the baton for the first time. That was the best smile I've seen all year and I hope they give her the video of that.

Boston: I really enjoy the first two thirds of the show. MARIMBA SPIRITUAL IS SO DOPE THOUGH. Spelling out the Conquest hits in Morse while playing the Conquest hits was amazing. Was that backflip Jesus in their guard this year? FIRE STILL PRETTY. The bad: Salvation is Created is a meh. Amazing Grace and Castaway, also meh. (Possibly related: I'm Jewish; the Christian religious texts, while well written, aren't my thing.) Uniforms are a no from me, but not as much of a no as others (will discuss below). The Lost/Found spell-out was...a bit much.

BLOOOOOOOO: They're wearing Coats again! Yay! I mentally edited the clove cigarettes into the pit's mouths even though they weren't there (they weren't actually there, right?). Not sure why chairs this year--they seem to be a bit of a random choice (or at least, don't serve as specific a thematic purpose as the ramps and the Line last year). Unis look good. Music was enjoyable in the moment but none of it's sticking with me currently. Singer was good! It's nice to hear Bluecoats doing jazz again, too.

Cavies: Much like I liked last year's show more 7 years ago when it was called XtraordinarY, I liked this show more eight years ago when it was called Madworld. The lack of white up top on the uniform hurts the visual read, or at least doesn't help the visual read as much as the white hats and shoulder wings used to help the visual read. Seriously, just a white hat would help. Singing--meh. Out-of-balance Lou Reed--also meh. But that's a good hornline, point blank (as opposed to a good hornline by Cavies standards). It'd be nice if they had a better design to work with.

Crown: the leaked uni photo was bad. Then the official reveal looked good. Now that we've seen them under the lights...back to bad. On the move, the tail looks like someone left the flap of their onesie open. The extra draped bits around the arms are bad, too. They feel cluttered visually, and I think the draped bits are part of the problem. Then again, they placed first in visual tonight, so what do I know? Brass is as good as ever. Percussion did not step back after last year. "If I Fall" was quite lovely. "Blow It Up, Start Again" was made for the Bluecoats and I'm sad we're not hearing them do it, but that piece is awesome and Crown does it well.

Summary: I'm about 90% certain the champion this year is coming from out west (up from my usual 60% sure when Vanguard isn't coming off a medal). I think the only two corps that we saw tonight that have a chance to jump up are Bloo and maybe Crown (once the rest of the show is on the field and they fix the visual). And I think this could be a year where the powers that be say "hey, none of the shows this year are that great, let's call the margins ever so slightly tighter to boost the competition aspect," a la 2015.

Prefer to see hornlines with shoulders and a shape as part of their projection strengthwise. Just too old and used to the old style I know, but just a gut reaction to uniforms that diminish a Tuba players presence. Nice to see blood back in coats

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Just now, bluehull said:

Prefer to see hornlines with shoulders and a shape as part of their projection strengthwise. Just too old and used to the old style I know, but just a gut reaction to uniforms that diminish a Tuba players presence. Nice to see blood back in coats

bloo that is, auto spell did it again

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Other than the house lights remaining up during the entire Blue Stars show and the incessant chattering of a group of tweens a few rows behind me, I experienced an enjoyable evening at a nearly sold out theater.  I took my seat knowing that I was about to see/hear the competitive first drafts of productions with seven weeks of revisions to come and I was thrilled that each of the six corps provided moments I loved. After perusing many of the posts on this thread, I may be an outlier as the Bluecoats were decidedly my favorite with Phantom my second favorite and I thought the placements and spreads were spot on. I also stand by my longstanding belief that sideline interviews (although a bit less cringeworthy tonight) are completely unnecessary.  Looking forward to more debut performances in the days ahead.

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