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Then vs Now


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16 hours ago, Stu said:

You are so right! Just like Bruno Mars programmed quantized autotuned Uptown Funk of today is way, way, way, way better than anything by George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic. Yep.

I'd never make that argument. But I would say that  a mic'd soloist playing with great tone can bring just as much to the table as a screamer of old. I was against electronics when they came out, and I still dislike a lot of what's done with them (thunderous goo, out-of-place obviously artificial sound effects) but they have improved some things.

My comments were geared more to the overall level of musicianship and the difficulty of the books. In the 80's corps were still relying somewhat on membership from their geographic region. Sure, some power corps would attract members who they would help find a place to stay and a job so that they could march, but mostly you had to live in driving distance. Now kids fly in from every corner of the country to try out and that's had a big impact. The number of college music majors on the field is way up.

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Speaking of Phantom 89, I don't think Will Pitts could write something well enough to do it justice.  I fear for his writing today much less having to redo a Wren masterpiece.

 

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Image result for statler waldorf get off my lawn

How these threads always play out...

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15 hours ago, Super Don-O said:

I'd never make that argument. But I would say that  a mic'd soloist playing with great tone can bring just as much to the table as a screamer of old. I was against electronics when they came out, and I still dislike a lot of what's done with them (thunderous goo, out-of-place obviously artificial sound effects) but they have improved some things.

My comments were geared more to the overall level of musicianship and the difficulty of the books. In the 80's corps were still relying somewhat on membership from their geographic region. Sure, some power corps would attract members who they would help find a place to stay and a job so that they could march, but mostly you had to live in driving distance. Now kids fly in from every corner of the country to try out and that's had a big impact. The number of college music majors on the field is way up.

A) Playing a trumpet solo utilizing the advances in technology certainly can create a different sound than just accoustic. And it would be great to hear someone in DCI who can play like Miles Davis doing just that. However, the quantizing autotune so-called corrective enhancement used in the industry today is nothing more than lazy cheating by sound engineers. And DCI will go more and more in that quantizing direction; mark my words. As for the great accoustic players who can produce sound like Maynard and Doc, they are no longer allowed to shine in DCI. The academic snobbery, yes I said it, who have infiltrated DCI hates, despises, the idea of FFF sound in the stratosphere; they call it vulgar.

B) The '94, that's over 24 years ago, BD brass/perc book is mere water compared to the writing today in the second decade of the 21st century. Hmmmm... Wow, that is interesting to know.

C) There were just as many great individual players back in the day as there are today; they were just spread out amongst way, way more corps. Great pro musicians of today even came out of corps like River City Railmen. Take a look at the results from I&E back when it was a prestigious event and forty plus or so entrants per category was the norm. Yes players from SCV, Regiment, BD, Scouts were at the top. But individuals from Marion Cadets and General Butler were also making it into the top three if not winning at their solos. The difference in DCI today is that many times a great player has no corps close to perform and be the star with; the touring costs and other costs have killed them, so the great players now fly to the few corps which remain. That in turn produces corps today which end up with higher concentration of steller players, and granted, more depth in the third parts.

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Star 90-93 and BD 91-94 are still some of my favorite music books of all time

but the original post asked for a comparison to the 80's which is what I was gearing my answers toward

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1 hour ago, Super Don-O said:

Star 90-93 and BD 91-94 are still some of my favorite music books of all time

but the original post asked for a comparison to the 80's which is what I was gearing my answers toward

Ok, so the '80s arranging of La Fiesta, Malaguena, Channel One Suite, West Side Story, Festival Variations, Russian Christmas, et al suck compared to the arranging today. Well okey dokey then.

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26 minutes ago, Stu said:

came out of corps like River City Railmen. Take a look at the results from I&E back when it was a prestigious event and forty plus or so entrants per category was the norm. Yes players from SCV, Regiment, BD, Scouts were at the top. But individuals from Marion Cadets and General Butler making were also making it into the top three if not winning at their solos.

I remember the French horn player from the Vagabonds... Pat Kavanaugh... one of the best drum corps Frenchie players of all time. The guy cleaned up at the I&E shows, circa 1970s.  He'd beat everyone... big corps, small corps, whoever.

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Just like performers, there really are no more or no less great arrangers from yesteryear to today. The difference is that arranging emphasis has changed.

In the early days of DCI, the seventies, arranging was about staying as true as possible to the source material within the rather severe limiitations of the available instrumentation. Writing for those archaic horns were a trick to say the least! Some arrangers did it well, others were not so good.

Then in the eighties and nineties it was about creative melody, phrasing, identifiable musical communication, with better quality 2 valve then 3 valve G brass allowing for more complex writing. Only now it was also done with ever increasing visual enhancement and complexity. Some arrangers did it well, others not so well.

Then around and post Y2K it flipped to where the drill and movement drove the design bus and sound became the underlying enhancement. The brass did switch to Bb/F, but the visual driven arranging lead to chord, chord, run, chord, run, hit;... Music that was almost too disjunct both melodically and phrase wise to listen to when heard apart from the visual motion. Some arrangers handled that well, others poorly.

Now it is about staging. Little musical snippets here, then move to a riser and play musical snippets there, then lay on the ground in a pose and play a musical snippet, stage, move, stage... Again some arrangers are doing that well, others not so well.

I will say though that while I have favorites from each decade from 1972 to 2018, my personal arranging preference is how music was handled during the mid eighties through the late nineties.

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I remember 87 SCV bugle line doing slurs and buzz rolls at DCI East during a rehearsal- later that day I was at lunch and my ears were still ringing. 30 years later I can still remember how impressive the power and sound was. Today’s corps are extremely talented and impressive in other ways, but the acoustic power and sound of THEN is missed. 

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