Has Audience Culture Changed?

[Precious Roy]

9 minutes ago, GUARDLING said:

I judged a show quite a while ago. It was a pretty well-known band. The show was fantastic. Their designers had drum corps connections. That summer the same show with many of the same elements were on the DCI field. This show was the Godfather.

Starting to stray off topic a bit here, but thinking about it -- that could prove to be an interesting operations model:  a DCI corps' show designers align themselves with several high level HS bands, and use their competitive seasons as "trial balloons" for the upcoming DCI season. Whichever band's show gets the most positive feedback from the judges, that's the basis for your drum corps show the next summer. You get a couple months head start on the design process for the show (with direct input from judges), and get to weed out design ideas that later are deemed to "not work as well," or those that become apparent that they have less room to grow.

[Jeff Ream]

21 hours ago, Fran Haring said:

For better or worse, my viewing experience with DCI corps this year will be limited to the 15 corps I'll see at the "prelims at the movies" night in August.

It will be interesting to see how many shows I "get" on first viewing, and how many leave me wondering about what the heck I just saw.  LOL.

i've watched everyone on Flo at least 2 times and i'm still wondering on a few

[Jeff Ream]

20 hours ago, xandandl said:

if it were just progression and not WGI dictates, why have DCI corps not fielded other approaches than just WGI?

I think you have drunk so of the  WGI koolaid that you can't experience other possible tastes.

it's entirely possible that everything has blended into everything else. Band used to be one way, usually a few years behind drum corps, and in fact DCA was usually a few years behind DCI. WGI was its own beast. As the designers have become more integrated will aspects of the idiom, the ideas bleed over into the others. Sometimes its great, sometimes it's bad. 

[MikeRapp]

4 hours ago, MikeN said:

Having high school-aged kids (ack!) and going to many, many band contests, I think in general the audience is more educated and sophisticated.  The general "etiquette" for marching performances has standardized and evolved over the years into what it is now.  I don't think it's due to lack of excitement from the corps, if anything, I think people might be afraid of missing something exciting next. 

Also worth considering - in the digital age, *way* more fans come in to a contest having already seen or heard the show, so there may not be the general spontaneous reactions there used to be.

Mike

You latter point is definitely accurate.

[GUARDLING]

1 hour ago, Precious Roy said:

Starting to stray off topic a bit here, but thinking about it -- that could prove to be an interesting operations model:  a DCI corps' show designers align themselves with several high level HS bands, and use their competitive seasons as "trial balloons" for the upcoming DCI season. Whichever band's show gets the most positive feedback from the judges, that's the basis for your drum corps show the next summer. You get a couple months head start on the design process for the show (with direct input from judges), and get to weed out design ideas that later are deemed to "not work as well," or those that become apparent that they have less room to grow.

It's been happening already for some.. Maybe not a full out same show BUTparts of it for sure. I can probably list many ( but won't ) who's theme and or show design that would be considered VERY similar. When I stated that staffs of WGI< DCI> BOA>DCAare pretty much the same. same could be said of many judges. Like it or not we are the same in many ways.

[denverjohn]

2 hours ago, Precious Roy said:

Starting to stray off topic a bit here, but thinking about it -- that could prove to be an interesting operations model:  a DCI corps' show designers align themselves with several high level HS bands, and use their competitive seasons as "trial balloons" for the upcoming DCI season. Whichever band's show gets the most positive feedback from the judges, that's the basis for your drum corps show the next summer. You get a couple months head start on the design process for the show (with direct input from judges), and get to weed out design ideas that later are deemed to "not work as well," or those that become apparent that they have less room to grow.

2004: Yellooooow, Ba-looooooo, Orange.... ( Tarpon Springs to Boston)

[N.E. Brigand]

On 7/22/2018 at 10:36 AM, xandandl said:

Performances in the previous century were programmed for crowd reactions. When Michael Cesario was program director with the Cadets in the mid-80's, he'd actually write on the show script and music book: "And the crowd goes Wild!!!" (Saw it myself several times.)

This century, shows have become "art" and we don't interrupt the artist until the program is completed. Might miss those subtle electronic voice-overs thrown at us, the suicide that occurs on the back forty, the hanging on the lower front, or the stark silence the "artistic director" wants us to "experience" in isolation and solitary bleakness in his black clad doom-and-gloom dark shows that have become too common.  Case of major depression at work if you ask me.

It's worth remembering that even in classical music world, the idea that audiences should be quiet during the performance is relatively recent and would have seemed strange to many of the most famous composers.

[N.E. Brigand]

On 7/22/2018 at 11:35 AM, SFZFAN said:

It's simple really. Drum Corps has become far less entertaining than it used to be. 

In some ways yes, in some ways no. I think that if you had a time machine and dropped a bunch of 1980s or 1990s drum corps into Saturday's show, a large part of the audience would complain that they were boring, just for different reasons than you find today's performances boring.

[N.E. Brigand]

On 7/22/2018 at 1:32 PM, Jim Schehr said:

Many of these productions don't translate or communicate well to the audience. It is unfortunate that the activity has become monkey see monkey do. Very few come up with a creative, original idea. My heart goes out to marching members - they're only a reflection of what was put in front of and/or on them. Truth be told, if I never see some of these productions again this season, I won't feel like I missed anything.

For me it's about the music and marching and the quality of performance. I miss the high velocity intricate marching drills which are now replaced with jumping, hopping, skipping, running, posing, twirling, laying down, ballet, dancing, and now gymnastic tumbling, not to mention the pushing, pulling, dragging, lifting, climbing, standing and riding of props. Only a few corps have the prop thingie down - most props are horribly made and grossly underutilzed.

My polite applause at the end of a performance is not always for the production but instead for the marching members trying to do the best with what they were given, and a reason to stretch my legs. 

I have no objections to opinions like these--some of which I agree with--and I don't want to pick on your post in particular, but I would like to request that people be more specific, as often as possible. Whose jumping don't you like? Which show ought to have more drill? Are there shows that do have more drill? Which ones? Are they being underscored? Would the audience generally agree with you or do they prefer what they see?

[N.E. Brigand]

On 7/22/2018 at 1:57 PM, BRASSO said:

Finally, do Corps and show sponsors still put out program books that audiences can read a little bit about what the year's show theme is, and what its supposed to convey? Oh, heavens no. Programs books that are handed out to ticket purchasers so that they can read what the themes for that season is  is a rarity these days now. Ironically, as Corps move toward what they would like to be considered as Art and Theatre Productions, they have surprisingly seemed to have forgotten that most Theatre productions and Art Museums have program books that explain the storyline of the Production or the thought process behind the Art Piece.

 

How many in today's DCI audiences understand the intellectual constructs behind the intellectual approached shows? I think most of us here know the answer to this: it's few. So knowing this, if audiences seem a bit tepid with the themes conveyed in Corps shows that are more geared for intellectual stimulation, is this not to be expected when so little attention has been given to them via show program books or other means to engage them intellectually prior, in the first place?

When I saw "Toy So(u)ldier" at Massillon in 2010, Cadets had volunteers by the gates handing out little sheets explaining the show. That seemed a bit much. But you're right that program guides seem to be less common in drum corps these days--and I would add that even when there is an explanation, it's often not very clear. If you can't explain your show in at most a few paragraphs, it suggests you don't have a firm grasp on it yourself.

That said, as someone who works in theater, I can tell you that audiences often don't read their playbills anyway.