How often is the finals performance the BEST performance of a corps ?

[cfirwin3]

I think this is my first post for the season!  Looking forward to the next few months checking in here and talking to all of you fine folks.

For me, I see every show (performance) as fairly unique, given the millions of variables across thousands of moments performed by a hundred+ people.  "Perspective" is a strange thing as well.  Some are looking at the brass performance, some are looking at the visual and even more specifically at the guard, some are focused on the field percussion, and very very very few people are both equipped enough and willing enough to give an accurate, full appraisal in the moment of a performance.  That's why there is a panel of judges and that's also why these sorts of judgments are delivered after a repeat video viewing.  I recall nights, as a performer, exiting the field, feeling like the show was whacked out and then being told that the run was superb, and visa versa.  I remember one night where the field drums were convinced that we had a rock solid run and the horns universally felt that there was some pretty persistent ensemble music tearing going on... the staff was completely neutral, and they didn't mention anything unusual one way or the other.

At the same time, championship shows are pretty darn consistent.  Really, the differences from night to night at any point in the season (excusing any program changes that are done) are really specific and fairly minor at that level.  I think that fans put a lot of weight in fairly small, but obvious issues.  But that isn't really how a judging panel sees the picture (by design).

Ultimately, drumcorps remains like "Who's Line is it Anyway?" where everything is made up and the points don't matter... but at the same time the adjudication does make a valiant effort to be focused and consistent, with such small point values between competitors.  I think that they do tend to award the 'season winner' on finals night, but not by conspiracy.  I think it is inevitable, given the above, that even very close scoring competitors will settle into their places, regardless of the minor variances (as obvious as they may be to fans).  And for the same reasons, sometimes there are surprise winners on the last night.

I remember one night, the week before finals (might have been 97) where the Cadets had a major collapse in the drill (multiple falls and tumbles in a domino effect).  By all measure, THAT was a bad night.  But the scores and the placement tracked exactly where they had been when they were announced!  The fact of the matter is that a plus-value adjudication system isn't overly focused on strange occurrences and unusually snowballing, eyesore (earsore) problems.  Adjudication is concerned with bigger picture matters that should be apparent... do these kids sound like they miss-align this phrasing regularly, or is this clearly a unique manifestation, caused by something else that might have happened?  We did something similar at an RCA Dome morning regional show, where a section of the field looked like a brass instrument accessory yard sale at one point!  But we still managed to win the event and jump several places for the evening lineup.  The staff told us "Judges aren't here to dwell on that stuff.  They are looking at bigger, more meaningful things within their captions".

All of that to say... Are some higher-scoring, winning finals performance observably not as good as lower scoring prelims or semis performances?  Yes, but I don't think it matters to the design of the adjudication, and I'm okay with that.

[IllianaLancerContra]

On 4/13/2023 at 12:14 PM, Tenoris4Jazz said:

 

I found it.  1981   Vanguard won M&M by 0.05 and finished 2nd in drums, brass and GE.  BD finished 2nd in M&M and 1st in 8 of 9 subcaptions in brass and GE.  SCV got perfect scores in Degree of Excellence for Drums and Drum GE.  Devils drum line finishing 9th cost them a title.

 

Just looked at 1981 DCI prelims- 10 All-Girl,  39 Class A (now Open Class), & 49 World Class Corps in competition.  98 total. In Canada.  Where it is now impossible to get to.  Golly. 
 

But yes- interesting recap

Edited April 14, 2023 by IllianaLancerContra

[Sideways]

9 hours ago, DFA1970 said:

Felt flat? I have no idea what you mean. They won most captions.

Was there all three nights and BD was the better corps at prelims and semis. SCV owned Camp Randall on finals.  Captions were/are an average of all three nights.  If I recall correctly BD did not have their best percussion run on finals either and it showed in the recap.

[Jeff Ream]

14 hours ago, DFA1970 said:

Felt flat? I have no idea what you mean. They won most captions.

yeah, but following the electric SCV performance, BD did feel flat. yeah they performed well, but it didn't have the energy SCV had. 

[DFA1970]

11 hours ago, Jeff Ream said:

yeah, but following the electric SCV performance, BD did feel flat. yeah they performed well, but it didn't have the energy SCV had. 

Great Jeff thanks for your millions of responses to this forum. 

[waliman4444]

I just finished watching the 99 finals performances of BD and SCV...Both were clean, as one would expect, but SCV seemed to me ( from youtube quality) the fan favorites and more energetic...I understand that BD won and I'm ok with that also..peace

[TOC]

5 hours ago, waliman4444 said:

 I understand that BD won and I'm ok with that also..peace

Did someone change the tie?

[Jeff Ream]

12 hours ago, DFA1970 said:

Great Jeff thanks for your millions of responses to this forum. 

i hit a mil? #### i never counted.

[waliman4444]

11 hours ago, TOC said:

Did someone change the tie?

My bad..had another result in mind..peace

[Fran Haring]

On 4/11/2023 at 12:33 PM, ironlips said:

In my view, the Finals performances are rarely the best of the season. Notable exception: Bridgemen '76, (and then they fainted).

I marched six seasons with DCA's Sunrisers, and from my perspective the only year we did our absolute best overall performance at DCA Finals was 1981.

We definitely smoked at Finals in 1978 (one of three championship wins during my years there)... but I honestly think we were better overall the weekend before at the show in Bridgeport, CT. We had a lot of great runs that year. 17 shows (including prelims/finals)... 14 wins, three losses.

Quite frankly, during the "prelims and finals on the same day" era of DCA (through 1988) it was tough, if not nearly impossible, to do two great performances in one day. 

 

 

Edited April 17, 2023 by Fran Haring