1976 Madison Scouts

[BG984]

In 1976, the Madison Scouts took the field as the defending DCI Champions.  Recently, I heard an early season recording of their 1976 show.  Frankly, not only did they have significant performance issues (even considering early season), the show "wasn't working" for them.  In a brazen effort, they scrapped a good portion of the show and drill, and thus had to literally learn mostly a new show during the season.  I believe that I heard that they had some  days where they learned new show all day long, then did a runthrough or two of the "old show" and had to compete with their old show that night.  The move paid off (not in gold, but silver).  The 1976 DCI Championships were the first that I attended.  Madison came on last at finals as defending champion, and lit it up, and did themselves proud, taking 2nd, as the Blue Devils won their first title.    I have some questions regarding this.......

1.  I believe that they did do a mid-season camp to finish the new show....is this correct?  Did they pull out of any contests?  Or were they in-between tours, just doing weekend shows, and learning the new program during the week?

2.  When did they unleash their new show?

Kudos to them for pulling this off.  I bet it was a crazy season for the members.  The corps was very talented....winning brass at Championship prelims, and Brass GE at finals, and tying for first by one of the drum judges.....as some have said, it would have been interesting if they had one more week (or had this show at the beginning of the season).....though BD was a machine by season's end, and had a well-deserved first title.

 

 

[HouserCD]

Madison performed their Theme from “Shaft” opener when they toured in California in 76.  I remember watching them perform at Pacific Procession (SJSU Stadium) before they changed to “Stars and Stripes Forever”.  At that time I heard they were already learning the new music on the bus while still performing the original show on tour.