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Does tradition mean anything anymore?


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So, Mike, do you agree that the talking during the percussion feature is not musical, making narration the only non-musical auditory element of drum corps?

I find it interesting that whenever someone has something bad to say about amps or narriation they always turn to The Cadets. What about the other corps using it? The Crossmen have an entire section of their show made to sound like someone surfing around on a radio. To me, that a lot more obnoxious than someone singing during a ballad. I'm not saying I dont' like it. I can see the reasoning for them doing it, it fits their show. The Cadets and all the other corps using narriation have put a great deal of thought into their show design and wouldn't have put it in there unless they thought it was necessary. I am tired of everyone constantly bashing on The Cadets. If you are going to criticise something be sure to remember everyone who falls into the same boat. To me, it seems like sometimes it's not really the amps or narriation that bothers people so much, it's George Hopkins. People are just using the amps as an excuse to bash someone who is only trying to change the activity, as he believes, is for the better.

Now that I got that out of my system let me say this. I have been reading this board all summer and haven't commented about any of the Cadets bashing. I was just going to try and stay out of it. I loved last years show, it is one of my all-time favorites. I saw them this year early in the season and didn't really care for it, it didn't make much sense to me. However, I saw them in Atlanta and gained a whole new opinion of them. In fact, I was one of the few people in my section that gave them a standing ovation. Yeah, the talking during the drum solo was a little distracting, but I got over it and focused on something else in the show that I liked. So maybe everyone else should try to do the same thing. Find something positive to focus on. If you don't like the entire show then go get a hot dog or something.

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I find it interesting that whenever someone has something bad to say about amps or narriation they always turn to The Cadets. What about the other corps using it? The Crossmen have an entire section of their show made to sound like someone surfing around on a radio. To me, that a lot more obnoxious than someone singing during a ballad. I'm not saying I dont' like it. I can see the reasoning for them doing it, it fits their show. The Cadets and all the other corps using narriation have put a great deal of thought into their show design and wouldn't have put it in there unless they thought it was necessary. I am tired of everyone constantly bashing on The Cadets. If you are going to criticise something be sure to remember everyone who falls into the same boat. To me, it seems like sometimes it's not really the amps or narriation that bothers people so much, it's George Hopkins. People are just using the amps as an excuse to bash someone who is only trying to change the activity, as he believes, is for the better.

Now that I got that out of my system let me say this. I have been reading this board all summer and haven't commented about any of the Cadets bashing. I was just going to try and stay out of it. I loved last years show, it is one of my all-time favorites. I saw them this year early in the season and didn't really care for it, it didn't make much sense to me. However, I saw them in Atlanta and gained a whole new opinion of them. In fact, I was one of the few people in my section that gave them a standing ovation. Yeah, the talking during the drum solo was a little distracting, but I got over it and focused on something else in the show that I liked. So maybe everyone else should try to do the same thing. Find something positive to focus on. If you don't like the entire show then go get a hot dog or something.

The Cadets's show came across great from where I was sitting in Atlanta. My main complaint from when I saw it in Birmingham was that the singer was heavily overpowering the hornline. They seemed to fix that in Atlanta. Sure, my tickets were nosebleed endzone, so it might have come across differently near the 50.

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Tradition really is in the eye of the beholder. ==== <Wrong. Tradition means *tradition*, like a martini is a martini and not Kool-Aid, like a Ferrari is what it is and not a Toyota wannabe.> ==== Some view their tradition being with their innovation. ==== <Huh? Tradition and innovation don't mix, like hanging vinyl siding on the White House.> ====

We all like tradition and old times past. ==== <Some will argue with that.> ==== And while it is important to acknowledge it and keep it close, it cannot hold back progress. ==== <"Progress", yes. There's that word they used when they tore down Ebbets Field, the Fox Theatre in San Francisco and Pennsylvania Station. If it isn't improvement, it isn't progress.> ==== I would be incredibly upset if drum corps was the same way in 15, 20 years as it is now.

Somehow I don't think that will be a concern.
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Retreat takes a long time to do

Didn't seem to be too much to ask for during the first 30+ years of DCI's history, and (I presume) in the pre-DCI days, too. Are kids today that much softer than those who came before? It's a treat for the fans and a proper ending to the evening. The old-style retreat, including having the corps play themselves off the field one-by-one and trooping past that night's champ, is the one thing I miss most and bringing it back would be my first act if I were made the Czar of DCI.

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... Tradition is alive and well. The tradition of Kids giving up there summer jobs, video games, and couches to get the @#$% knocked out of them to make 11 minutes of magic and a lifetime of memories. It is alive and well. The tradition of parents and drum corps junkies paying out big $ to get crammed together on hard metal bleachers to get their 11 minute fix and maybe a few brief hugs and a lungfull of diesel fumes. Alive and well. The tradition of small but vocal few complaining about how different it is from in 'the good ol days' and how much better things would be if drum corps followed their plan. Alive and well.

That is the way it was twenty years ago and still is today. Tradition marches on. Isn't it beautiful?

I read this and thought, "Yep, that pretty much says it all."

Then, of, course, I saw there were six more pages to read so I knew, of course, I was wrong.

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Didn't seem to be too much to ask for during the first 30+ years of DCI's history, and (I presume) in the pre-DCI days, too. Are kids today that much softer than those who came before? It's a treat for the fans and a proper ending to the evening. The old-style retreat, including having the corps play themselves off the field one-by-one and trooping past that night's champ, is the one thing I miss most and bringing it back would be my first act if I were made the Czar of DCI.

:worthy: All hail Orpheus, Czar of DCI!

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What's so innovative about the Cadets' 2006 show? Singing and talking have been in drum corps (wrongfully so, in my opinion) the past couple years, and in BOA for at least a decade.

Not too bright, are we?

innovation:

Noun

1. The act of introducing something new. 2. Something newly introduced.

Other forms

in'no·va'tion·al adj.

The main driver for innovation is often the courage and energy to better the world. Innovation has punctuated and changed human history (consider the development of electricity, steam engines, motor vehicles, et al).

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Nothing. That's perfectly fine; I don't want to see innovation, I want to see some great drum corps shows that would be great twenty years ago, today, and twenty years from now.

That's a pretty fascist way of looking at it.

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And about the Fiddler on the Roof ...

Did he not follow Tevye out of the burned village?

Tradition is something we all carry with us ... on our backs or in our hearts.

Either it can be the heavy burden too much to bear at times

... or it can be that sweet tune we follow inside us as we dance on to better days.

(Just my three pennies worth ... thanks for listening.)

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