World Class Corps can breathe again! (14-20)

[xandandl]

Yup, you can dress a pig in a tuxedo but it's still a pig.

[cixelsyd]

15 minutes ago, DFA1970 said:

Like as stated...regional shows. And I agree those are shows but not WC shows. So no need to be nasty. You know what I'm saying.

Yes, I do.  And the irony does not escape me. 

I am sorry for conflating you with other frustrated fans from the left coast.  You are not the first to complain about how top California corps are out of state for so much of the summer, and that California has no chance to see live shows in championship form (i.e. late season).  But it appears that Western fans, generally speaking, are more interested in having their top corps do well nationally, even at the expense of sending them off on tour by July 4th.  A number of excellent drum corps programs spent decades pursuing alternatives to that kind of touring, and achieving great things on the field, a couple even knocking on the top-7 door... but only a comparative fraction of the California drum corps community turned out to support them and their approach.

Now, when those top two organizations "re-evaluate", they make their cuts to the B corps tours.  If you truly thought your suggestion of reverting to regional tour for their A programs had any chance of consideration, this should demonstrate the odds of that ever happening.

[Jeff Ream]

2 hours ago, DFA1970 said:

Too me this is a troubling sign of the state of this activity. Some of you guys think BD and SCV are just ROLLING in money and can spend tons of amount of money into the activity. THEY CAN'T. Our live performances END in CA late June and very early July. The fact the both SCV and BD OC corps are not touring later on is not good news for WC corps. I don't see it that way. OC just might be permanently non-existent in the near future. 

If anything, it shows the Open Class model of payouts needs to be improved. I mean it needed to be done that way prior to this announcement

[Jeff Ream]

59 minutes ago, BRASSO said:

 Of course something else is planned, Tim K... both SCVC and BDB have gone on limited DCI tours like this many times before that did not include their going to DCI Championships, and have always filled in the time they were not on summer tours with something else for the marchers in their Corps.  What is somewhat unique here is that their limited travel choice for 2019 will not involve even the Northwest, Arizona, Idaho, etc  but will include only California.

 As such,  Its likely both BDB and SCVC will have to do something interesting and enticing for both Corps Directors/ Staffs/ Marchers, as historically  there has been very little appeal to potential camp auditioneers and veteran Corps marchers to go/ stay with Corps that intend to only compete in state, and not go outside their state to compete with other Corps. Also, the Corps Director for SCVC was apparently neither involved, nor aware of this decision, until recently..Thus, his resignation a couple of days ago. This decision for both Corps bares watching, as it would appear to me that travel expenses is not the only reason for this decision.

and per the various releases, Acheson is aware and on board. So I think rumors of abdicating DCI is unfounded

[BRASSO]

Just now, Jeff Ream said:

and per the various releases, Acheson is aware and on board. So I think rumors of abdicating DCI is unfounded

 I had not heard of any rumors of DCI HQ. abdicating anything with these SCVC/ BDB announcements. So maybe that rumor was from another social media outlet, Jeff ?

[queenanne_1536]

4 hours ago, Cappybara said:

I find it more interesting that SCV and BD announced this together 

Me too, so I have to wonder what is really going on here. It seems weird to me that both organizations would come to this conclusion independent of one another.

I have long thought if you're open class, you're open class, and they should not advance on to world prelims. 

[Jeff Ream]

1 hour ago, BRASSO said:

 I had not heard of any rumors of DCI HQ. abdicating anything with these SCVC/ BDB announcements. So maybe that rumor was from another social media outlet, Jeff ?

there's so many rumors out there about this, even i cant keep up. 

[Jeff Ream]

44 minutes ago, queenanne_1536 said:

Me too, so I have to wonder what is really going on here. It seems weird to me that both organizations would come to this conclusion independent of one another.

I have long thought if you're open class, you're open class, and they should not advance on to world prelims. 

despite the legends of the two groups hating each other, there's a lot of communication between them, and other groups. As I said earlier, I sat by board members of two other DCI corps this past weekend, and they dropped the hint it was coming. And both thought it was good for all.

[xandandl]

38 minutes ago, queenanne_1536 said:

Me too, so I have to wonder what is really going on here. It seems weird to me that both organizations would come to this conclusion independent of one another.

I have long thought if you're open class, you're open class, and they should not advance on to world prelims. 

Let us be clear that there were 2 principally business reasons for why Open Class corps are allowed to compete/perform in World Class championships prelims and semis...and potentially Finals.

1. When the decision was made in this century, there was concern that the number of corps was dwindling. Remember that once upon a time DCI prelims took 2 days with almost 100 corps at its apex. Now it has dwindled to only 2 dozen World Class units. Since the same amount of money was being spent for renting LOS all day, Open Class corps were allowed to fill the void.

2. Sell more tickets. If Open Class corps were to compete in World Class championships, they would not be skipping Semis and Finals for a trip home. Their parents, families and friends would spend more money to see their darlings perform again. Shelling out $$$ for the three more days isn't going to equal the Gross National Product but it could help DCI pay one or two bills.

but DCI pushed a third reason, idealistic. It gave the Open Class mms another experience in a large venue and a goal to keep striving for (make top 25, 17, 12, etc.)

My own thinking has evolved on this. Originally I was opposed to reasons 1 and 2 feeling DCI was (ab)using the younger kids. But 3 had some merit. With the quality of Open Class programs we've witnessed (and enjoyed) the past several seasons, I think participation in World Class championships Prelims and after should be permitted only for the top 5-6 Open Class corps. In other words, a reward for a job well done and earned as much as any medal or trophy is. Other corps seem lost in such a vast canyon and it is unrealistic to the mms. 

[MikeN]

On one hand, I just saw our check from DCI for appearance fees.  Yeah, nobody in OC is getting rich off of DCI, that's for sure.

On the other hand, we get a better Finals week return on our investment than anyone except the top 12.  We get to perform on Monday, Tuesday (in general) and Thursday.  3 shows is a good setup for our week.  The bottom WC corps get *one* show in Indy.  Semis corps get two.  If those groups are lucky, they get a performance somewhere near Indy earlier that week.  The top groups, of course, get the big shows on Monday/Tuesday, then the performances at LOS.   It's been a pet peeve of mine for a long time and speaking definitely for myself only, tour planning needs to take into account travel cost vs appearances more.

Mike