Best show from a percussion standpoint.

[Jeff Ream]

Glassmen '01, liked that book a lot.

REALLY enjoyed Prosperie's work with Phantom '95, especially with the jingle sticks. Some of the pit stuff in that show was outstanding as well.

BD '95 had some great drum parts that year as well. The writing in the closer absolutely makes the song, and that's my favorite closer of all time. Whole drumline looks ready to kill someone once the show ends. The Cavies '95 line did some sweet stuff as well.

CADETS '93 TENOR BREAK!!!

Early-mid '90's Cadets, Thurston was a god. The grooves in those lines were amazing.

Bob Dubinsky did wonders for the Star drumlines in the early '90s.

My favorite drum break ever was probably BD '98. Impeccable clarity, and ridiculously tasty parts in the feature (the section before the park n' blow). Love the bass parts, and the line got even better in '99. The '99 snare break at the beginning of the...song before the closer, I believe (?), was one of my favorite snare licks ever.

I personally (please don't kill me for this) enjoyed SCV '03 more than '04 from a percussion standpoint. LOVE the '03 pit parts, and definitely thought they outperformed Cadets, with a seemingly more difficult book.

Bluecoats pit, '04. I'll avoid advertising '05 just because I marched there and my thoughts on the drum book/performance are probably biased (I don't really think they are, but don't really feel like taking the chance.) I have some great video clips of the drumline playing various show excerpts.

Phantom '03 was underrated, VASTLY improved over '02. Same with Magic '03.

I'm lucky enough to have a recording of the judges tape, of the BD '88 opener. Early season, but its definitely still entertaining.

you mean Crossmen for Thurston right?

[Linnehan13]

I don't think SCV from 2004 gets enough credit.

Almost transcendent for it's time.

Indeed, SCV 04 is a great percussion show. The vibes players are awesome, as is the quad line.

Glassmen '01, liked that book a lot.

Bluecoats pit, '04. I'll avoid advertising '05 just because I marched there and my thoughts on the drum book/performance are probably biased (I don't really think they are, but don't really feel like taking the chance.) I have some great video clips of the drumline playing various show excerpts.

Phantom '03 was underrated, VASTLY improved over '02. Same with Magic '03.

Glassmen got 3rd in percussion that year, what a great line, especially the quads.

I've said it to my friends, and they didn't believe me, that the Bluecoats' pit from 04 was one of the best in DCI. Some pretty clean runs in that show.

Even though Phantom 03 was improved from 02, it still was pretty dirty. A great book though. The bassline was so melodic.

[Jami]

I don't think SCV from 2004 gets enough credit.

Almost transcendent for it's time.

You read my mind Anth. Hands down, by far, the most musical percussion ensemble book I have ever heard in DCI. Front ensemble and battery are so cohesive with each other that it's scary.

[Maestro767]

I was just going to say that, Jami. Unbelievably unified and interrleated between pit and drumline.... and sooo musical.

I don't know a lot about percussion, but I do know that both the 1998 and 2004 SCV shows FORCED me to pay attention to the drumline and pit. In particular, I remember the awesome tenor stuff from 98, and frankly 2004 was just sick.

Cavaliers 1999 and 2000 were awesome as well, but SCV 04.... "JESUS!"

Edited December 14, 2005 by Maestro767

[chris ncsu]

I don't pay ALL that much attention to the percussion section specifically, but some of what I thoroughly enjoy (and you'll notice that I tend to pay attention to 1983 forward, no offense to those who came before, there's just SO MUCH to listen to as far as DCI goes)...

SCV 2004, 99, 89/88 (my all time favorite book)

Cadets 2003 (my GOD), 94, 93, 92, 88

Cavies 90, 92 (yum), 95, 00

Phantom 88, 89, 93, 96!, 03 (my second favorite book)

Glassmen 98

and I'm probably leaving a lot out that just aren't coming to mind at the moment...

A note about Cadets 05...no doubt a very very clean line, but I don't particularly like the arrangements around the Industry part (drum break and such), they're SO busy that the arrangements sound...cluttered to me...so that it doesn't sound clean to me...specifically the snare line solo and the tenors solo... (again, I know they're playing them near perfectly, it just doesn't sound good to me).

[Matt_S]

I'm not a drum guy, but I remember being impressed when I listened to SCV in 2002. That hasn't been mentioned yet in this thread, so I was wondering what drum people reading this thought of them that year.

[Jared_mello]

you mean Crossmen for Thurston right?

Oh wow, I meant to type "Crossmen" instead of "Cadets" there. I looked all through my post for the sentence I had written about the Crossmen, so I could move the Thurston quote to it, and then realized I hadn't ever actually written Crossmen at all. That's a #### of a freudian slip.....Hopkins has clearly premiered his mind-altering gas in phase two of world domination. (First was clearly amps in DCI). Sorry about that.

[chris ncsu]

I'm not a drum guy, but I remember being impressed when I listened to SCV in 2002. That hasn't been mentioned yet in this thread, so I was wondering what drum people reading this thought of them that year.

Yeah, that's a good one, too, especially the opening and closer (Trivandum, is that what it was called?).

[mingusmonk]

Oh wow, I meant to type "Crossmen" instead of "Cadets" there. I looked all through my post for the sentence I had written about the Crossmen, so I could move the Thurston quote to it, and then realized I hadn't ever actually written Crossmen at all. That's a #### of a freudian slip.....Hopkins has clearly premiered his mind-altering gas in phase two of world domination. (First was clearly amps in DCI). Sorry about that.

It was fairly obvious that when you followed "Thurston" with the word "groove," you certainly were not talking about Cadets any longer.

[rut-roh]

Although I LOVED the Cadets 05 show, it has nothing on Star 93. Thom Hannum is my favorite percussion instructor of all time. The way he writes is just so mind-blowing. b**bs The first time I watched Star 93, I was like "What? :spit: Play that again! That was so clean, and choptastic, and it went right with the music!" The pit was also amazing. On a video of them playing, when they do an extended trill, their heights are way up there and they are producing so much sound and they are in time. I haven't seen a corps come close to them since. Everyone plays it safe and just amplifies their pit.

Cadets 87 is also up there.

I've been a big fan of Hannum's for the longest time. One show of his that I don't think gets the respect it deserves from a writing standpoint (and additional kudos to Jim Ancona for the incredible pit arrangements) is the percussion book for 1998 Crossmen. He basically took the Paul Wertico drum set parts from the live Pat Metheny Group CD ("The Road To You"...a must have, IMO), and put them on the football field. Wonderful stuff! So musical. So tasty.