The Marching Arts

[BigW]

17 hours ago, JimF-LowBari said:

Skipped around and actually the blurb on MB drill master A R Casavant. Had his son Charles as the band director at college the one year I was in the band. Charlie did corps style drill in 70s/80s and no more than 150 members. Any more people would “get in the way of my drill”.

ps DCI “forced” corps to go to band instruments in the 90s? If he is talking about allowing all keys then where was the “force”. 

WCU had a complete collection of the Casavant books. For the post WW2 era, utterly fascinating and groundbreaking, maybe more important then many realize. They were thin, roughly 8 by 14 books with photos of miniature bandsmen in the various forms on a model field. A couple dozen of those volumes IIRC were done. Any Band Director could pick one of the volumes which had 2-3 shows in them, adjust the sets for their group, pick music to play to the drill, and voila! Instant show for the masses at the Big Game.

 

The thing was, the drill had no relation to any music, all things you could just plug into whatever one chose to do, which for that era made it handy. "Opener" for instance.... then some suggested counts between each set. It definitely wasn't corps style/presentational style drill. Very logical transitions, and not really set to any music per se.

 

Once in awhile, I'd see a band or 2 from WV doing Casavant style material, one in particular was really good at it, very clean and precise on the evolutions, which wasn't exactly easy to do.

 

I think, Jim, a lot of his Dad's style rubbed off on Charlie. There were moments it wasn't exactly Corps style to say the least when I'd see IUP off and on. Some head scratching moments now and again.

[JimF-LowBari]

When I was in the MB in 77 Charlie hadn’t been there that long and think was driven to show he could carry on the family legacy. One weekend A R came up and heard Charlie was stressed over the whole time. I’ll have to try to google some of those books to match the drill we did, what little I remember that year. Some follow leader, some gate to block, one scatter drill that had me outside the back sideline (oops). 

Found a copy of the MBs studio recording that year in my parents stuff. MB on one side and jazz band on other. Maybe burning to cd and listening will bring up more memories. Might have something in silent home movie clip too. At least that is on dvd... burned from vhs... which was copied from original Super8.

and finally only one year in MB. Transferred from HACC and trying to get caught up on credits took too much time. If I would have known how rough 77 was I wouldn’t have been in at all

Edited March 7, 2019 by JimF-LowBari

[HockeyDad]

Much as we are poking fun at this YouTube video, there is a ring of truth to it. There are fewer corps now. Alarmingly so. The G bugle has been abandoned, along with its unique qualities, many of which are missed. Moments of marching and drill excellence creating their own wow moments are replaced by the “look at me” style craziness. Uniforms have been replaced by costumes. We can’t deny the truth of this. But... is this because of the “executives of DCI”?  Or would it have happened on its own over time, as every year each corps struggled to put something new and different on the field?  I don’t know. 

[JimF-LowBari]

32 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

Much as we are poking fun at this YouTube video, there is a ring of truth to it. There are fewer corps now. Alarmingly so. The G bugle has been abandoned, along with its unique qualities, many of which are missed. Moments of marching and drill excellence creating their own wow moments are replaced by the “look at me” style craziness. Uniforms have been replaced by costumes. We can’t deny the truth of this. But... is this because of the “executives of DCI”?  Or would it have happened on its own over time, as every year each corps struggled to put something new and different on the field?  I don’t know. 

Are some good points from the pieces I saw but then it got buried in some of the “wait a minute” tidbits. 

Well everytime someone blames DCI for whatever be it change, loss of corps, etc I say look at the same thing going on with the DCA side. 

The spittle rate in the response goes from low (yeah hits them all) to very high (yeah DCI runs DCA)... lol

Edited March 7, 2019 by JimF-LowBari

[Ghost]

Replies to my email and others have already been deleted.

"It's about 30yrs to late,  I could have narrated this myself long ago ... To late now ... a small group of people have been robbing  this activity since DCI started ... and the sad thing is we let it happen ... It's to late to turn back now . death by a 1000 cuts ."

"This echoes what I have been saying for years. How could DCI be that dumb? "

[Stu]

18 hours ago, garfield said:

 

 

(At 1:47:20, our own Stu's post in DCP is highlighted.  Way to go Stu!  Is that proof that you, Stu, are the "Stuart" referenced as author of this?)

Was not going to watch it; knew it was going to be boring; was not even going to read through the thread except I am home sick today. But good ole Gar, ya just had to make me curious, so I clicked on the vid. Thanks buddy! Well....

If ya look close, that post was dated 2008; this Stu (me) did not join DCP and start posting until 2010. So that Stu, not this Stu, authored the post. Also not the first time someone here got this and that mixed up. What we really need on DCP is one more Stu; we could then have this, that, and the other!!!

[Stu]

18 hours ago, Jeff Ream said:

Our Stu is nowhere the bloviating mess the documentary author is.

 

 

(I'll just let that comment stand on it's own LOL)

Ummmmm....thanks.....I think. (I'll just let that comment stand on it's own LOL)

Edited March 7, 2019 by Stu

[BRASSO]

 Today, the " Marching Arts " are indeed mostly school and community based now, with few Churches. Veteran groups funding the units anymore like they used too before DCI was started in the early 70's.

 The growth of the " Marching Arts " activity the last several decades has not been DCI, nor DCA in the Marching Arts. It has been WGI ( Winter Guard International ). DCI predates WGI by approx. 6 years. DCI had far more members their first season than WGI had their 1st seaaon ( 1977-1978 )

  Today WGI has  1,830 Guards listed on their website. 895 Percussion units. 205 Winds Units, for a total of 2,930 units. They no longer are limited to just rifles, flags, sabres. Now they have divisions for competition with all manner of brass instrumentations as well. Some of the WGI units are similar to some of the DCI units in that they compete locally, not regionally, nor nationally. This was true throughout the Pre DCI years, and today as well in the Drum Corps activity.

 WGI units compete indoors, and with smaller numbers of marchers in their performing competition units. This keeps their costs down to operate, and for individuals of limited income means to participate.. As such, its a model that has worked well for them, and probably why they have exploded in growth since their formation, expanded their offerings, and now have far more participating members than DCI and DCA combined now. They toot on brass instruments, bang away on drums, toss flags, sabres, batons, wooden rifles, etc into the air, and  march to their hearts content.. just like units did in the 1920's and 1930's. Its still Youth doing healthy things to learn healthy competition, strive for group and individual perfection, learn discipline and teamwork, time management skills, and learn to build self esteem, and self confidence in the process. The " instruments " upon which they have learned these life long skills that benefit themselves as well as our society might have changed a bit over the years ( as they always changed ). But the primary benefits to the individuals as well as to our society for the participation has not changed one iota. And thats the big picture here that the " I don't like modern Drum Corps " folks oftentimes appear to be missing with their vitriol and overly harsh criticisms, imo. And the thing is... one can pick out ANY era,  from the 1930's to today, and find people that did not like that decades version of Drum Corps, but instead preferred the one that they marched in. Such criticism is nothing new. Lots of folks from the 40's,50's, 60's, did not much care for Stuart Rice's 1970's to the early 1980 's  personal version  of" modern  Drum Corps "   back then either, believe me.

Edited March 7, 2019 by BRASSO

[JimF-LowBari]

1 hour ago, Stu said:

Was not going to watch it; knew it was going to be boring; was not even going to read through the thread except I am home sick today. But good ole Gar, ya just had to make me curious, so I clicked on the vid. Thanks buddy! Well....

If ya look close, that post was dated 2008; this Stu (me) did not join DCP and start posting until 2010. So that Stu, not this Stu, authored the post. Also not the first time someone here got this and that mixed up. What we really need on DCP is one more Stu; we could then have this, that, and the other!!!

And that Stu made his “reputation” on ramd... ugh....🙄  And to respond to brasso, heard that ain’t drum corps in 1975. Something about marching bells and getting rid of Color Pre.

Edited March 7, 2019 by JimF-LowBari
Marching bells not matching sheesh spell check

[HockeyDad]

32 minutes ago, BRASSO said:

 Today, the " Marching Arts " are indeed mostly school and community based now, with few Churches. Veteran groups funding the units anymore like they used too before DCI was started in the early 70's.

 The growth of the " Marching Arts " activity the last several decades has not been DCI, nor DCA in the Marching Arts. It has been WGI ( Winter Guard International ). DCI predates WGI by approx. 6 years. DCI had far more members their first season than WGI had their 1st seaaon ( 1977-1978 )

  Today WGI has  1,830 Guards listed on their website. 895 Percussion units. 205 Winds Units, for a total of 2,930 units. They no longer are limited to just rifles, flags, sabres. Now they have divisions for competition with all manner of brass instrumentations as well. Some of the WGI units are similar to some of the DCI units in that they compete locally, not regionally, nor nationally. This was true throughout the Pre DCI years, and today as well in the Drum Corps activity.

 WGI units compete indoors, and with smaller numbers of marchers in their performing competition units. This keeps their costs down to operate. As such, its a model that has worked well for them, and probably why they have exploded in growth since their formation, expanded their offerings, and now have far more participating members than DCI and DCA combined now. They toot on brass instruments, bang away on drums, toss flags, sabres, batons, wooden rifles, etc into the air, and  march to their hearts content.. just like units did in the 1930's. Its still Youth doing healthy things to learn healthy competition, strive for group and individual perfection, learn discipline and teamwork, time management skills, and learn to build self esteem, and self confidence in the process. The " instruments " upon which they have learned these life long skills that benefit themselves as well as our society might have changed a bit over the years ( as they always changed ). But the primary benefits to the individuals as well as to our society for the participation has not changed one iota. And thats the big picture here that the " I don't like modern Drum Corps " folks oftentimes appear to be missing with their vitriol and overly harsh criticisms, imo. And the thing is... one can pick out ANY era,  from the 1930's to today, and find people that did not like that decades version of Drum Corps, but instead preferred the one that they marched in. Such criticism is nothing new. Lots of folks from the 40's,50's, 60's, did not like Stu Rice's  1970's to the early 1980 's  personal version  of" modern  Drum Corps "  then either, believe me.

That’s a fine defense of the WGI model. But I thought the video was focused more on DCI. I will confess I skipped through large portions of it however.