Madison Scouts 2023

[rpbobcat]

15 minutes ago, Cappybara said:

 

Rebuilds take time, I agree with what a previous poster said (was it C Holland?) which is to give this design staff some time to gel and come together. You don’t fire your head coach after the first 1-2 seasons, you’ve got to give them a chance to establish their culture, systems, and philosophies

 

Well, the Denver Broncos did fire their coach after one season.

Allowing a design team time to "gel" and come together sounds good.

But you are dealing with "free agents" so unless you're BD, there's no way to assure they will 

stick around.

[HockeyDad]

Fourth competitive year in a row, not even close to the top 12. The leadership team is being real crafty and sneaky in their rebuilding. I will give them that. It’s like you can’t tell they are rebuilding from their placements. Are they telling the judges to score them lower so they can explode into the top 12 next year?

[C.Holland]

My $0.02.  And its not an easy yay or nay.  

I'd like to know what the plan for next season's show is.  Good designers generally have ideas ready to go, that way you can plan in Sept and Oct for November's roll out.  They also can assess the concerns, and have plans to remedy problematic situations. 

I think the performers can play, however I have concerns at the rate to which they are coached.  What we saw the last few days, is where I had hoped for this corps to start.  And had it been this way, none of these conversations we would be having right now.

So let's revisit the past seasons shows.
Between The Lines.  - so well done I wish this would have been last or this years' shows.  Well assembled, well staged, well coached.

Installation 85 - The idea is super different, and had promise.  But the execution just wasn't there.  the full integration where we could see the development of the ensemble merging with the gallery/museum just never hit.  Good charts, interesting idea, and well performed by the end of the season.   But it always felt 6 weeks behind schedule. 

Sound Garden - An idea...  or at least a name.  But I'm not sure of the idea.  Which as person who spends way too much time in a dark theatre designing, bothers me.  I'm still not sure of the narrative.  The performers, again, are executing at a level we hoped to see out of the gate.  But this show feels like it's missing concept, as well as 8 weeks behind schedule.

So this was year 3 of the artistic staff.  2.5 if you don't count the exhibition season as a real season.  

I would say "what's next years idea, and what's your thoughts to improve the artistry on the field?".   I think that would give me my answer.   While I dont believe all success is what's shown on the field, I do think that an incohesive product two season's in a row means (to quote NFL Today) coaches being put onto a hot seat.   I also think this is hard to answer until students get quizzed about their summer experience, their ideas for what needs to be better, and what they liked.  They're the one's paying for the experience, they're the best recruiting tool, and they're the ones who'll leave you working to fill either 30 open spots or 130 open spots.  

Short answer. do I think a full purge is necessary?  no.  Do i think that there needs to be a very short leash and some significant plans laid out for artistic success? absolutely. 

[Gantang]

21 hours ago, Cappybara said:

Last night, they were only 1.3 points behind a corps that only about a week ago was fiercely in the fight for the 12th place spot.

2023
Final score 82.988
4.1 out of 12th place
.488 out of last place in World Class.
Final placement 16th. (SCV would have pushed them to 17th).
They were only 1.71 ahead of the Open Class Champion.  
All metrics are worse than 2022.

2023
Final score 83.725
3.7 out of 12th place
3.475 out of last place in World Class. 
Final placement 15th.
They were 2.675 ahead of the Open Class Champion. 

By what metrics did Madison improve this season? 

[Vuitton]

The only improvement I see this year was in their musical book.

Honestly though, although I'm not a designer I would said that ball was the dumbest idea ever to the person who presented it. It was there for the sake of being there. It was there for the sake of having a mobile prop. It served no purpose and did nothing to enhance the show.

I mean the freaking show title has garden in the name. They could have done so much with that to create an interesting sound garden effect. They could have gone crazy with different types of instrumentation (steel drums, using electronics to make different sound effects, homemade instruments, make music out of things you wouldn't expect, etc...) to create a true sound garden effect. They could have had props that were actually musical and that mimicked a garden in design, and had them be moveable and create different effects based on location, and filled that whole stadium with different and unique sound. They could have used those weird sound baths as inspiration. They could have been innovative in using different sounds in DCI. There's so much they could have done with just having the freaking word garden in the show title.

I have not ounce of education or experience in design and I've already thought of several ideas that were better than what we saw on the field.

You give a design team like Regiment had in 2022 a chance, you trash an entire design team if they put together a program as lackluster and unimaginative as this.

Edited August 12, 2023 by Vuitton

[TenHut]

In any organization, change must start at the top and cascade down from there.

[mjoakes]

54 minutes ago, Vuitton said:

I would said that ball was the dumbest idea ever to the person who presented it. It was there for the sake of being there. It was there for the sake of having a mobile prop. It served no purpose and did nothing to enhance the show.

I didn't get it, either. Maybe others did and liked it. 

That's me being open and tolerant on DCP. Dialing down tolerance I'd agree it was plain dumb.

[GREENBLUE]

26 minutes ago, TenHut said:

In any organization, change must start at the top and cascade down from there.

Sounds easy, but who’s going to leave their current position and come to Madison that’s going to be an upgrade?  Money talks. 

[Vuitton]

59 minutes ago, GREENBLUE said:

Sounds easy, but who’s going to leave their current position and come to Madison that’s going to be an upgrade?  Money talks. 

There is money and there's also opportunity. If I were a staff person, I think a great opportunity would be turning a downtrodden program one into a champion program. Mason left the comfort at Colts for the unknown at Star and look what happened. Look at what JW did at Vanguard and now at Mandarins. That to me would be so exciting.

The probably is no good designer wants to work under the current tyrant.

Edited August 12, 2023 by Vuitton

[GREENBLUE]

Great to see Madison back at Finals!!!!!!

(sorry couldn’t resist)

 

Edited August 13, 2023 by GREENBLUE