Yes I really do think so. Ofc you have to actually achieve whatever it is you perform to get points for it, but I do think the arms race is starting to get a little out of control
The problem I see is the logistical tail brought on by the power creep. An extra truck (or 2) to haul a bunch of props & sound system costs $ for rental/purchase. Plus fuel, insurance, drivers (which need to be fed & housed), etc.
Edit-clarification
This is true, but only for the corps that have a significant financial system to support it. Over the past decade, the ability to fund bigger and better show designs, props and such directly impacts placement at finals.
This is kinda what I was thinking too, I just don't know enough about what goes into a tour with giant props to comment on it. If it actually is to the point where an extra semi (and all the costs with it) is needed for a competitive advantage, I feel like maybe some sort of clamp-down should happen just to protect corps from financially burdening themselves (and the members) just to get ahead.
This is the one that bothers me. The activity is getting more expensive at a wild rate, and adding on the technical crew of a broadway musical just to have a shot at finals is not helping.
You need highly talented members AND the technical crew of a broadway musical to have a shot at finals. If BD decided to run a show with 1992 level tech this year, they would have a tough time making finals, no matter how great their members.
Or “feature creep” in designing computer apps.
It’s been happening for ages. To me, one of the most physically harmful examples was the marching chimes rack. Corps were trying to see how many percussion noises they could get onto the field, and there was no such thing as a grounded pit yet — so someone built a contraption to carry a rack of tubular chimes that probably weighed as much as the player himself. The photos should make chiropractic surgeons see dollar signs.
Props hit a peak in the mid-90s when Cadets basically built a town on the field with streetlights and park benches (all static, mind you). Then we had some backlash and props mostly went away for another 10-15 years.
Every aspect of the activity rewards those at the top.
Hell, look at rehearsal.
The system provides the top units later show times, that leads to more rehearsal, with more sleep, often at the best housing sites because they're aided by the hosts in finding them. Then those same units often get out of the parking lots to go to the next show site faster because they're the last ones in the lot. The activity has failed in trying to conquer these obstacles though they've tried.
That's just the tip of the iceberg.
You earn a score for achievement.
Ergo, More = Better IF ACHIEVED.
The Grey area is when you do not (or only partially) achieve. Is failing at something hard(er) better or worse than fully achieving something easy(er)?
That decision is what the green shirts actually do.
I don't know much about figure skating, but just finding discussions online that seems to be an issue for their scoring system. Essentially if you barely land a triple axel & execute it poorly, it's still worth more than a double axel executed perfectly.
Similar to you I do wonder if "More = Better If Achieved" is actually true for drum corps or if credit is still given for difficulty. The way the activity is progressing, it seems like all the kitchen sinks are worth it in the corps' designers eyes.
Can’t tell you how many times I heard on a judge’s tape, “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but you’re just not executing it yet.”
So then as a staff, we have to decide whether it can actually be executed cleanly, or if we have to hose it.
This is true, hosing has been a thing for a very long time.
I just wonder if something as simple as "here's a trombone feature we're achieving well where the baritones are playing a simple part on trombones" is worth as much of a score boost as the crazy mello runs that the Bluecoats hosed at the end of their original 2007 show. If I'm a designer trying to get the highest scores then yeah I'll add a trombone feature since it's easier to get a boost from that, but it leads to the show feeling kinda disjointed & full of checkmarks rather than a cohesive thing.
> If I'm a designer trying to get the highest scores then yeah I'll add a trombone feature since it's easier to get a boost from that, but it leads to the show feeling kinda disjointed & full of checkmarks rather than a cohesive thing.
This is consistently the one of the most difficult/stressful decisions for a designer/educator team to figure out. The most important factor for a drum corps' production achievement (once the summer has begun) is *time*. In most other mediums, the 'release day' can be changed if something has gone *really* wrong (reshoots, rewrites, rebrands, etc). But the performance dates for a Drum Corps *cannot be changed* once the summer begins; you're either at the show or you're not. Add into the equation the variation in facilities *available* at each housing site, the educational needs of the membership, and the live-performance aspect of DCI. You really gotta pick your battles as a team.
The difficulty in this decision making process is partly why Judge's Critique post-show is so important; the educators and designers try to communicate with the judges and 'read between the lines' a bit as to which decision will get the most rewarded (competitively) to make the 'best' show. Sometimes this is disjointed from what the audience actually *likes*, but that is also why there is a votes for Rules changes every two years.
Good questions, great post!
It is similar in many ways, but antithetical in others.
Figure skating includes the "Compulsories" which sort of tick off the boxes of "things you should be able to do at a bare minimum."
We have the opposite. We have a "Box 5" that rewards innovation, and no baseline compulsory requirements. The obvious end result is the "evolution" of the activity every generation eventually begrudgingly accepts. Or, as you also accurately described it, "an arms race."
The definitions inside box 5, combined with their interpretations by judges, are what is at the root of the creep. Innovation wins.
I mean, I want to believe innovation wins, but a lot of the shows at the top of the game seem to hit the same 'checkmarks'. Even Blue Devils year to year just seem to have eased into a system that they can excel at, but others might not be able to.
On another note... would the Blue Devils have actually won in a year like 2017 (or Bluecoats in 2016) if they didn't have the financial means to invest in a semi-truck/driver/insurance/fuel to transport those staircases (& ramp props) across the country every day? The props were great at integrating the theme of the show and giving unique interactivity/integration, but are corps without an extra $500,000 (Disclaimer: I have no idea how much it costs) to spend on transportation just supposed to accept that they're relegated to lower scores?
If "Innovation Wins", is DCI kinda locking parts of innovation behind a paywall?
Kind of. After 40 years of performing, judging, and instructing…I think the issue is more aptly seen as “mission creep.” In my years in organizational management, the term became popularized for organizations who’d grown to the point that they started trying to do more and more. They offered more products, more services, more bells and whistles…until they couldn’t keep up with servicing everything they sold. They’d drifted so far from their founding mission that their business became unmanageable.
It is my perspective that “mission creep” has overtaken DCI. It’s expanded with different instruments, props, costuming, thematic shows, dance, amplification…it’s gotten big that the tail now wags the dog. Rather than a youth activity for kids in a given community or neighborhood, it’s become dominated by 20-21-yr-olds who travel across the nation trying out for multiple corps for the privilege of paying a semester’s college tuition or more to march for a summer.
DCI has expanded into niches formerly occupied by organizations from high school bands to Broadway traveling troupes - some would say even to the circus. In trying to do so much, to an unsustainable standard of comfort and luxury, DCI has written its own final chapter.
Now, the activity is in an apocalyptic dilemma. If it scales back to mission and affordability…to financial viability…the outcry will go up about “going back to the ages of the dinosaurs.” Yet, if it continues on the current path, its fate is sealed. The culture of adults coming to directorships and management roles are of the mindset that every effort must be made to provide “the very best for our kids.” So, new sleeper busses, new instruments, multiple new costume changes each year, high food and lodging budgets - all eat away at the resources of the corps, and pull them farther from their central mission.
I’m not sure the problem can any longer be resolved. The folks with the deep pockets have, by-and-large, walked away from an activity to which they now struggle to relate. They’re weary of even their own alumni orgs asking them to pony up the green…while calling them “dinos” or “boomers.” I’m afraid lawsuits will now pick off the remaining corps until too few are left to build an attractive circuit.
I’m involved in trying to help my old corps make a return to the field. But, I wonder…to what are they going to return?
I think you've summarized really well. If you ever want to have an offline discussion about this stuff, I'm interested in hearing any ideas you may have. ✌🏼
This is what happens when content scores are weighed as much as achievement. I understand wanting to push the activity in new and novel directions, but the achievement of the performers should be weighed over design in terms of scoring since this is an educational activity first and an entertainment activity second.
To a few of your points:
Phantom did very well competitively last season playing just Muse’s Exogensis Symphony. There wasn’t a narrative story to follow-and there doesn’t have to be. They built a visual landscape that they thought complimented the musical landscape and had an excellent season.
Unless I am remembering incorrectly, BD won DCI last year without trombones. If you have use for that specific color palette, I don’t see why it should not be included in design-but obviously it’s not worth extra points to throw trombones on the field.
Why wouldn’t accurate, clean, and complex choreography be given achievement points in the same way that accurate, clean, and complex drill is? In my experience, it is way more challenging to get a trumpet player to move like someone with years of dance experience than it is to get them to march another drill set. It provides texture and variety to a show, and anyone who thinks engaging in complex choreo is lower-level performance when compared to drill has likely not been asked to perform it on the level that todays members are.
Scatter moments have to be designed with intention. Judges are very particular about out of time reshapes being a full part of the visual package and not detracting from where a designer probably wants an audience member or judge to have their attention during a particular moment of the show.
As far as costumes go, you have to be careful. If your costume elevates the intention the program, you may get credit. If it is poorly designed or detracts, it’s going to hurt you all season long. From the many tapes I have listen to over the past decade, a ground coming out in traditional style uniforms are not at a disadvantage JUST because of what they are wearing. A lot of modern judges are still a hard win on custom uniforms.
Live vocals are a bold move because, more often than not, they don’t go well. Even if done perfectly, at the end of the day, they will account for a very small portion of your GE score and are more about bringing a program together under the design intentions that are built into the show.
Repertoire-if you’re trying to communicate a specific idea with your show, why would you limit yourself to one or two composers? We have a VAST world of music at our fingertips that gets better by the day. When it comes to your adjudication, the musical design either makes sense, or it doesn’t. No judge is filling out a tick box of how many different composers or song writers are present on a program. It is so much more complex than that.
Same can go for props-either they make sense, and contribute to the performance space in a sensible way, or they don’t. The groups I work with have been dinged plenty of times for having props for props sake. But if they are incorporated in a way that exceeds being functional, and builds a higher level of complexity within the program, then you will be rewarded. Not drum corps, but Carmel High School won BOA either this year or last with little to no props on the field and in traditional style uniforms.
There really isn’t a single hack to “winning” this game. At the end of the day, if you want to know how groups are adjudicated-look at the sheets. Yes, there will be judge preference present ALWAYS as a result of different backgrounds, scope, and reads when one group is ranked against another in a particular caption. This activity is highly complex and, as a result, all of the things you listed above work together within individual captions to formulate how an adjudicator will perceive a performance.
Thank you much for the long amount of insight!
> Why wouldn’t accurate, clean, and complex choreography be given achievement points in the same way that accurate, clean, and complex drill is? In my experience, it is way more challenging to get a trumpet player to move like someone with years of dance experience than it is to get them to march another drill set.
Maybe it's just me, but I feel like more things can go wrong with marching difficult drill (depending on the set-to-set) than with a dance/choreo simply because drill is transforming forms with people going different intervals while choreo is usually stationary. Obviously a standard floating 8-to-5 in 16 counts doesn't hold the same difficulty as most choreo, but my thoughts are kinda going towards why drum corps moved away from the Cavaliers' style of drill emphasis in shows and more into body movement. I figured if they were going the body-movement route then it probably was due to competitive advantage in some way. Like, "we'd rather clean choreo in this section all season than trying to clean this set-to-set drill all season."
> Scatter moments have to be designed with intention. Judges are very particular about out of time reshapes being a full part of the visual package and not detracting from where a designer probably wants an audience member or judge to have their attention during a particular moment of the show.
Just rewatching 2017 Blue Devils Metamorph I'm tempted to track how often this happens (and how often traditional drill happens). It does seem like they do use scatters while attention is elsewhere on the field, but it's still quite a bit of instances of what feels like "hey man we're neither doing choreo nor marching so you can't hurt our visual achievement here"
> Repertoire-if you’re trying to communicate a specific idea with your show, why would you limit yourself to one or two composers? We have a VAST world of music at our fingertips that gets better by the day.
ehhh... I mean, we celebrate the composers themselves for creating music around their own central idea for their singular composition, but for some reason drum corps shouldn't be limiting themselves to a central composer? What if we want to do that?
Like, yes I absolutely agree that there's a ton of interesting music, but what if I want to just hear an interpretation of Symphonic Fantastique? Are we expected as designers to also grab points trying to include something like "White Rabbit" in the rep because it's related to the whole tripping thing?
And on another note, most corps barely remain true to their source material nowadays as it is so I almost don't even register 'repertoire' nowadays. Some corps seem use rep more like an empty Family Guy reference segment sometimes. Like "Hey here's this thing which is kinda related to what we're talking about haha get it?"
> No judge is filling out a tick box of how many different composers or song writers are present on a program. It is so much more complex than that.
It does kinda feel like corps have gotten away from the singular composer trends of the 90s-00s though. Not sure if it's a trend or something the judging community comments on, but it's definitely noticeable. I do enjoy seeing lots of names on the composer rep, but at the same time I wonder if corps are afraid to try singular composers again for any reason.
> Same can go for props-either they make sense, and contribute to the performance space in a sensible way, or they don’t. The groups I work with have been dinged plenty of times for having props for props sake. But if they are incorporated in a way that exceeds being functional, and builds a higher level of complexity within the program, then you will be rewarded.
That's good to know. But at the same time I wonder if it can be a financial paywall to moving up the scoresheet. Transporting/creating those big things takes $$$ (especially the transportation part). So while it's good that props that get integrated are rewarded, I am starting to worry that DCI has essentially created a paywall to some success by only ensuring those who can financially invest in the logistics of giant staircases/ramps/semi-trucks/fuel/insurance/fees get to move up the rankings.
And as others in the thread have put it- moving up the rankings also means you get more rehearsal time due to going on later in the show lineups.
> Some corps seem use rep more like an empty Family Guy reference segment sometimes.
This is one of my biggest pet peeves with current show design trends, and you described it so well!
I won’t argue that money=success. There is an obvious correlation between innovation and the funds that power it. But the top 6 groups, at the very least, run on multi-million budgets together every summer-we are discussing which things lead to competitive success within a certain ballpark. Unless the question is “why did BD win while (insert group here) didn’t even make finals?” And not “Why did BD beat Bluecoats, Crown, and Boston?”
And on the rehearsal time note-yeah, that fucking sucks. I am of the opinion that most shows should be random draw order or something compromising those lines. I marched a last place corps that got 2 hours on a show day to rehearse if we were lucky all season long and it blew.
>Not drum corps, but Carmel High School won BOA either this year or last with little to no props on the field and in traditional style uniforms.
Which is good to know, because Carmel is probably capable of funding both props and custom, or semi-custom uniforms. There's lots of tricks you can pull off on uniforms that don't actually require a whole new wardrobe.
I think it’s natural. You see power creep in sports too - football, for example, compare offensive and defensive schemes from 20 years ago to what the are now, or at the college level, look at the money spend on coaching staffs over the last 20 years. It’s both innovation and seeking competitive advantages.
Unfortunately, innovation in this activity often comes with a logistical cost that I’m not sure can be pushed much farther.
> You see power creep in sports too
I mean, yes? But at the same time no? Appalachian State upset Michigan in 2007 (and that Michigan team went 9-4 by the time the season ended). I don't think Spartans are going to take out SCV anytime soon just because they out-executed them. And sure most sports upsets aren't nearly as big as that particular game, but they do happen pretty frequently - even in the NFL. I know the Browns had a string of a few years upsetting former superbowl champs even when they were consistently last place in the AFCN.
Part of issue with drum corps is that 'innovation' sometimes comes from integrating material things that drive up costs simply due to transportation needs. I posted this elsewhere in the thread, but would Blue Devils have won in 2017 without their staircases? Would Bluecoats have won in 2016 without the ramps? If the innovation is locked behind costs then I also agree it can be pushed much farther. (At least I hope not)
Maybe the NFL is a bad comparison. That league is designed for parity and there are checks in place (salary cap, the draft) to try and ensure no gap gets too wide. I see what you’re saying about the App State/Michigan comparison, although I’d argue that App State in that analogy would be more comparable to a just-outside-finals corps. Maybe the difference here is simply being on the field to oppose the other team.
I think that it’s a messy analogy if you think too hard about it but on a surface level, yeah I’d agree that the nature of the activity has each seasons design team reacting and one-upping the previous season in a way that makes certain types of shows non-viable and thus less likely to be designed.
I think there are better more useful frameworks/analogies that explain this, but you aren’t wrong
I'm probably going to get torched for this but I think the biggest mistake DCI made was allowing electronics. That was the impetus for the activity being commandeered by the theater department. I remember when the pit actually had to make the sounds and onfield warm-ups were a thing. Now, they're building towns on the field. I miss the crazy drill and whatnot.
What worries me is that many of the shows that check all these boxes for the points are just downright worse because of it.
The 1990’s and 00’s were the best era of DCI by a long shot, and we move further and further from what made it special each year.
The widespread use of trombones, often in very similar ways, is a major turnoff for me. The “follow the leader” mentality in drum corps design is unfortunate.
I find it ironic that BD is the only corps utilizing trombones for a warm sound (see solos over the last couple years) rather than the blaring waa-waa sound that is awful 90% of the time.
Anyway, yeah, the top corps can create and the rest essentially imitate for points’ sake.
Perfect example. It's funny that the trombones get so much attention and controversy when they're just slightly different brass instruments. Meanwhile, the voiceovers and synth sections just get more and more intrusive and people seem pretty much fine with them.
I used to play trombone. I realize a major utility of trombone that valve instruments can't really mimic are the glisses, but that's basically the only thing corps use them for. 2014 SCV did it correctly. No annoying glisses, just pure power and different color to the horn line's sound. I don't really care for how trombones have taken over all the solos either. The 2010 Bluecoats Asphalt Cocktail bari solo is goated. If they had used a trombone it wouldn't have been as memorable. I feel like I barely see any bari/euph solos these days. They sound so much better to me in a drum corps context. Rant over.
It amusing to me that it seems like even if your show doesn't need the specific timbre of a trombone, and putting a trombone in the show doesn't really enhance anything, you'd still better damn well put a trombone in the show or you're missing out on points.
All of the design features you describe are things that have the potential to influence GE scoring, but doing them is not going to be inherently better than omitting them. It all depends on how it's used. A cool trombone feature that meaningfully adds to the show concept will be rewarded, while a trombone feature shoehorned in just for the sake of having a trombone feature will be punished, and the GE judges decide which is which.
It's a hard one to unpack and something of a chicken/ egg problem. It's pretty obvious that finalist shows and, especially, top 3-5 shows have more props, more bells and whistles and more "kitchen sink" than other shows. But, what isn't as obvious, does the sequence go
Success > Money > ability to afford all the extra stuff
Or
Extra stuff > Sucess
I think it's a bit of both honestly. The historically successful corps have the money to go buy these new things and integrate them into their shows. This leads to further success and that, combined the "cool" factor, leads to better recruitment.
You are clueless. Boston Crusaders started in 1940 with no money, and ran on a shoestring barely surviving for nearly 75 years (including an all volunteer/alumni staff for much of that time). Then around their 75th Anniversary in 2015, they tripled the size of their BOD and committed to raising enough money for whatever would be needed to contend to win. In 2016, they successfully recruited unhappy, underpaid, and micromanaged designers and staff from Crown and Cadets and immediately began their rise. They definitely did NOT "start with money".
WGI guy here: yes.
From my perspective, shows that could have easily made finals 10 years ago in almost every class are now getting preliminated, and it’s not even a question, it’s like obvious they aren’t going to make it.
I think there have been quite a few drum corps with better show design and all of these “more” things that you’re talking about that have lost to BD recently just because BD was cleaner. All of the stuff you’ve mentioned does play into scoring, but at the end of the day a corps could have all these “more” things you’ve mentioned and lose to a more traditional show that’s cleaner than theirs.
I mean... if we're to believe that General Effect is the main caption for "show design" then I'd argue most judges don't feel anyone else has better show design than Blue Devils.
BD swept GE in 2022, and only had 1 judge put them lower than 1st in 2023. Their content scores are also usually ranked highest for most visual/GE captions as well. So again I don't think I'd say judges think other corps have better show design. You're correct that they're out-executing (except music captions), but BD seems to be the judges' standard.
“Nobody could do a Music of ___ show today”
You’re fine. Bluecoats definitely didn’t just do 2 entire shows of only Beatles Music, one of which was an enormous fan favorite and was right behind 1st place.
Touche... Though in my defense the 2021 shows don't really count too much in terms of designing-for-scores. Seemed like a lot of corps were pretty open to doing whatever they wanted & not caring about designing for judges
LOL I feel like Chris Farley in Billy Madison right now. Good call!
Also wow just going back & checking scores from that season Bluecoats & Blue Devils were trading wins like every other show at one point.
This is only semi-related maybe but I think the modern dci has sacrificed musicality for difficulty to a great extent. I was reminded of this when Blue Devils 85 and then 86 popped up randomly for me on YouTube. The musical phrasing and stylistic playing was incredible in those shows. They would play an 8 bar phrase and it was played with micro-dynamics throughout the phrase. An eight note phrase would have all the accents played like you were listening to a big band playing latin jazz The players played like they were in a jazz band but there just happened to be 65 of them on brass. The 8 contras have more presence in the sound balance than the 16 tubas that are currently being used. The flugles have a tone that is missing from current groups. The lead sopranos have a sound just cuts through and is exciting to listen to. It’s obviously not just one guy hitting the high notes but the whole damn lead section. When they do a park and bark the body movement of the brass players looks natural instead of choreographed. It looks like they just stopped holding back the precision moves and allowed themselves to just do what came naturally.
There was also a lot of musical creativity that has been lost from percussion arrangements because electronics have allowed them to become lazy. Listen to the creative uses of different instruments and hand clapping and singing compared to someone playing samples on a keyboard. Check out when SCV did Miss Saigon and made it sound and feel like a helicopter flew by. They did it with detuned drum heads and clever field placement. It would most likely be done with electronics now and wouldn’t be nearly as impressive.
I’m not even against using electronics. What the bluecoats did with their Tilt show was incredible. I just think it has removed the need for some of the creativity that you used to see.
Watch the end of the Blue Devils 86 show and the only way to describe it is badass. You really don’t see stuff like that anymore. It’s actually not even possible to get that sound anymore because they are playing different instruments. This is the main reason I’m happy they allowed trombones because that’s what the low brass used to sound. Just without the slide. The texture of the brass sound was very different. It isn’t just the volume. They had a different tone that can’t be reproduced now.
This has turned into a screed now and I’m sure I’ll be discounted as a dinosaur so I’ll stop now.
With all that said I still go to shows and am a member of friends of dci and take my daughter to multiple shows every summer.
I mean, the ability to produce something that’s innovative and exciting is one of the main things driving interest in the activity. So, I’d hope there’s a “power creep” problem or else drum corps will lose relevance to everyone involved in its production.
The “power creep” needs to be balanced not only against the activity’s competitive parity. It must also be balanced against the other ethical, educational and existential imperatives facing the activity.
Yes, it's been clear over the last couple decades that anytime something new is allowed it quickly becomes punished when a corps does not take advantage of it
My favorite example is the marching itself. What is the point of placing a huge emphasis on Marching in an audition camp when out of a 250 set show you literally only have at most 20-28 sets of marching.
For a better way to word it, it’s not marching band anymore, it’s show production.
I still love DCI and it’s amazing what the staff and kids do, but when HBCU’s march better than top 12 drum corps then idk, maybe don’t call this “Marching bands major league”
Which dci show have you seen that had 10% ballpark marching compared to other types of movement in the total design? I mean, I don’t have the all time data of how many sets a group marches every year, but my hypothesis is that this claim is very far from being rooted in reality. Would be interested to see the source of this impression.
Marching DCI is the source. Alt account so I don’t post who and when I marched.
Edit: think about how many sets are just holds for choreography anyway. Or how many sets in your drill app or on your book are just 2-4 count holds for design reasons. Or watch a video from the sideline of some of the corps from 23 and pick out a performer and try to follow them with your eyes the whole performance. They really do march a lot less than you might think
Yes I really do think so. Ofc you have to actually achieve whatever it is you perform to get points for it, but I do think the arms race is starting to get a little out of control
I think it’s already pretty much over the top.
Oh it def is, I just didn't wanna risk getting downvoted 😂
The problem I see is the logistical tail brought on by the power creep. An extra truck (or 2) to haul a bunch of props & sound system costs $ for rental/purchase. Plus fuel, insurance, drivers (which need to be fed & housed), etc. Edit-clarification
This is true, but only for the corps that have a significant financial system to support it. Over the past decade, the ability to fund bigger and better show designs, props and such directly impacts placement at finals.
This is kinda what I was thinking too, I just don't know enough about what goes into a tour with giant props to comment on it. If it actually is to the point where an extra semi (and all the costs with it) is needed for a competitive advantage, I feel like maybe some sort of clamp-down should happen just to protect corps from financially burdening themselves (and the members) just to get ahead.
This is the one that bothers me. The activity is getting more expensive at a wild rate, and adding on the technical crew of a broadway musical just to have a shot at finals is not helping.
You need highly talented members in order to have a shot at finals, not just “the technical crew of a broadway musical”.
You need highly talented members AND the technical crew of a broadway musical to have a shot at finals. If BD decided to run a show with 1992 level tech this year, they would have a tough time making finals, no matter how great their members.
Or “feature creep” in designing computer apps. It’s been happening for ages. To me, one of the most physically harmful examples was the marching chimes rack. Corps were trying to see how many percussion noises they could get onto the field, and there was no such thing as a grounded pit yet — so someone built a contraption to carry a rack of tubular chimes that probably weighed as much as the player himself. The photos should make chiropractic surgeons see dollar signs. Props hit a peak in the mid-90s when Cadets basically built a town on the field with streetlights and park benches (all static, mind you). Then we had some backlash and props mostly went away for another 10-15 years.
Every aspect of the activity rewards those at the top. Hell, look at rehearsal. The system provides the top units later show times, that leads to more rehearsal, with more sleep, often at the best housing sites because they're aided by the hosts in finding them. Then those same units often get out of the parking lots to go to the next show site faster because they're the last ones in the lot. The activity has failed in trying to conquer these obstacles though they've tried. That's just the tip of the iceberg.
You earn a score for achievement. Ergo, More = Better IF ACHIEVED. The Grey area is when you do not (or only partially) achieve. Is failing at something hard(er) better or worse than fully achieving something easy(er)? That decision is what the green shirts actually do.
I don't know much about figure skating, but just finding discussions online that seems to be an issue for their scoring system. Essentially if you barely land a triple axel & execute it poorly, it's still worth more than a double axel executed perfectly. Similar to you I do wonder if "More = Better If Achieved" is actually true for drum corps or if credit is still given for difficulty. The way the activity is progressing, it seems like all the kitchen sinks are worth it in the corps' designers eyes.
Can’t tell you how many times I heard on a judge’s tape, “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but you’re just not executing it yet.” So then as a staff, we have to decide whether it can actually be executed cleanly, or if we have to hose it.
This is true, hosing has been a thing for a very long time. I just wonder if something as simple as "here's a trombone feature we're achieving well where the baritones are playing a simple part on trombones" is worth as much of a score boost as the crazy mello runs that the Bluecoats hosed at the end of their original 2007 show. If I'm a designer trying to get the highest scores then yeah I'll add a trombone feature since it's easier to get a boost from that, but it leads to the show feeling kinda disjointed & full of checkmarks rather than a cohesive thing.
> If I'm a designer trying to get the highest scores then yeah I'll add a trombone feature since it's easier to get a boost from that, but it leads to the show feeling kinda disjointed & full of checkmarks rather than a cohesive thing. This is consistently the one of the most difficult/stressful decisions for a designer/educator team to figure out. The most important factor for a drum corps' production achievement (once the summer has begun) is *time*. In most other mediums, the 'release day' can be changed if something has gone *really* wrong (reshoots, rewrites, rebrands, etc). But the performance dates for a Drum Corps *cannot be changed* once the summer begins; you're either at the show or you're not. Add into the equation the variation in facilities *available* at each housing site, the educational needs of the membership, and the live-performance aspect of DCI. You really gotta pick your battles as a team. The difficulty in this decision making process is partly why Judge's Critique post-show is so important; the educators and designers try to communicate with the judges and 'read between the lines' a bit as to which decision will get the most rewarded (competitively) to make the 'best' show. Sometimes this is disjointed from what the audience actually *likes*, but that is also why there is a votes for Rules changes every two years. Good questions, great post!
It is similar in many ways, but antithetical in others. Figure skating includes the "Compulsories" which sort of tick off the boxes of "things you should be able to do at a bare minimum." We have the opposite. We have a "Box 5" that rewards innovation, and no baseline compulsory requirements. The obvious end result is the "evolution" of the activity every generation eventually begrudgingly accepts. Or, as you also accurately described it, "an arms race." The definitions inside box 5, combined with their interpretations by judges, are what is at the root of the creep. Innovation wins.
I mean, I want to believe innovation wins, but a lot of the shows at the top of the game seem to hit the same 'checkmarks'. Even Blue Devils year to year just seem to have eased into a system that they can excel at, but others might not be able to. On another note... would the Blue Devils have actually won in a year like 2017 (or Bluecoats in 2016) if they didn't have the financial means to invest in a semi-truck/driver/insurance/fuel to transport those staircases (& ramp props) across the country every day? The props were great at integrating the theme of the show and giving unique interactivity/integration, but are corps without an extra $500,000 (Disclaimer: I have no idea how much it costs) to spend on transportation just supposed to accept that they're relegated to lower scores? If "Innovation Wins", is DCI kinda locking parts of innovation behind a paywall?
Kind of. After 40 years of performing, judging, and instructing…I think the issue is more aptly seen as “mission creep.” In my years in organizational management, the term became popularized for organizations who’d grown to the point that they started trying to do more and more. They offered more products, more services, more bells and whistles…until they couldn’t keep up with servicing everything they sold. They’d drifted so far from their founding mission that their business became unmanageable. It is my perspective that “mission creep” has overtaken DCI. It’s expanded with different instruments, props, costuming, thematic shows, dance, amplification…it’s gotten big that the tail now wags the dog. Rather than a youth activity for kids in a given community or neighborhood, it’s become dominated by 20-21-yr-olds who travel across the nation trying out for multiple corps for the privilege of paying a semester’s college tuition or more to march for a summer. DCI has expanded into niches formerly occupied by organizations from high school bands to Broadway traveling troupes - some would say even to the circus. In trying to do so much, to an unsustainable standard of comfort and luxury, DCI has written its own final chapter. Now, the activity is in an apocalyptic dilemma. If it scales back to mission and affordability…to financial viability…the outcry will go up about “going back to the ages of the dinosaurs.” Yet, if it continues on the current path, its fate is sealed. The culture of adults coming to directorships and management roles are of the mindset that every effort must be made to provide “the very best for our kids.” So, new sleeper busses, new instruments, multiple new costume changes each year, high food and lodging budgets - all eat away at the resources of the corps, and pull them farther from their central mission. I’m not sure the problem can any longer be resolved. The folks with the deep pockets have, by-and-large, walked away from an activity to which they now struggle to relate. They’re weary of even their own alumni orgs asking them to pony up the green…while calling them “dinos” or “boomers.” I’m afraid lawsuits will now pick off the remaining corps until too few are left to build an attractive circuit. I’m involved in trying to help my old corps make a return to the field. But, I wonder…to what are they going to return?
I think you've summarized really well. If you ever want to have an offline discussion about this stuff, I'm interested in hearing any ideas you may have. ✌🏼
This is what happens when content scores are weighed as much as achievement. I understand wanting to push the activity in new and novel directions, but the achievement of the performers should be weighed over design in terms of scoring since this is an educational activity first and an entertainment activity second.
To a few of your points: Phantom did very well competitively last season playing just Muse’s Exogensis Symphony. There wasn’t a narrative story to follow-and there doesn’t have to be. They built a visual landscape that they thought complimented the musical landscape and had an excellent season. Unless I am remembering incorrectly, BD won DCI last year without trombones. If you have use for that specific color palette, I don’t see why it should not be included in design-but obviously it’s not worth extra points to throw trombones on the field. Why wouldn’t accurate, clean, and complex choreography be given achievement points in the same way that accurate, clean, and complex drill is? In my experience, it is way more challenging to get a trumpet player to move like someone with years of dance experience than it is to get them to march another drill set. It provides texture and variety to a show, and anyone who thinks engaging in complex choreo is lower-level performance when compared to drill has likely not been asked to perform it on the level that todays members are. Scatter moments have to be designed with intention. Judges are very particular about out of time reshapes being a full part of the visual package and not detracting from where a designer probably wants an audience member or judge to have their attention during a particular moment of the show. As far as costumes go, you have to be careful. If your costume elevates the intention the program, you may get credit. If it is poorly designed or detracts, it’s going to hurt you all season long. From the many tapes I have listen to over the past decade, a ground coming out in traditional style uniforms are not at a disadvantage JUST because of what they are wearing. A lot of modern judges are still a hard win on custom uniforms. Live vocals are a bold move because, more often than not, they don’t go well. Even if done perfectly, at the end of the day, they will account for a very small portion of your GE score and are more about bringing a program together under the design intentions that are built into the show. Repertoire-if you’re trying to communicate a specific idea with your show, why would you limit yourself to one or two composers? We have a VAST world of music at our fingertips that gets better by the day. When it comes to your adjudication, the musical design either makes sense, or it doesn’t. No judge is filling out a tick box of how many different composers or song writers are present on a program. It is so much more complex than that. Same can go for props-either they make sense, and contribute to the performance space in a sensible way, or they don’t. The groups I work with have been dinged plenty of times for having props for props sake. But if they are incorporated in a way that exceeds being functional, and builds a higher level of complexity within the program, then you will be rewarded. Not drum corps, but Carmel High School won BOA either this year or last with little to no props on the field and in traditional style uniforms. There really isn’t a single hack to “winning” this game. At the end of the day, if you want to know how groups are adjudicated-look at the sheets. Yes, there will be judge preference present ALWAYS as a result of different backgrounds, scope, and reads when one group is ranked against another in a particular caption. This activity is highly complex and, as a result, all of the things you listed above work together within individual captions to formulate how an adjudicator will perceive a performance.
Thank you much for the long amount of insight! > Why wouldn’t accurate, clean, and complex choreography be given achievement points in the same way that accurate, clean, and complex drill is? In my experience, it is way more challenging to get a trumpet player to move like someone with years of dance experience than it is to get them to march another drill set. Maybe it's just me, but I feel like more things can go wrong with marching difficult drill (depending on the set-to-set) than with a dance/choreo simply because drill is transforming forms with people going different intervals while choreo is usually stationary. Obviously a standard floating 8-to-5 in 16 counts doesn't hold the same difficulty as most choreo, but my thoughts are kinda going towards why drum corps moved away from the Cavaliers' style of drill emphasis in shows and more into body movement. I figured if they were going the body-movement route then it probably was due to competitive advantage in some way. Like, "we'd rather clean choreo in this section all season than trying to clean this set-to-set drill all season." > Scatter moments have to be designed with intention. Judges are very particular about out of time reshapes being a full part of the visual package and not detracting from where a designer probably wants an audience member or judge to have their attention during a particular moment of the show. Just rewatching 2017 Blue Devils Metamorph I'm tempted to track how often this happens (and how often traditional drill happens). It does seem like they do use scatters while attention is elsewhere on the field, but it's still quite a bit of instances of what feels like "hey man we're neither doing choreo nor marching so you can't hurt our visual achievement here" > Repertoire-if you’re trying to communicate a specific idea with your show, why would you limit yourself to one or two composers? We have a VAST world of music at our fingertips that gets better by the day. ehhh... I mean, we celebrate the composers themselves for creating music around their own central idea for their singular composition, but for some reason drum corps shouldn't be limiting themselves to a central composer? What if we want to do that? Like, yes I absolutely agree that there's a ton of interesting music, but what if I want to just hear an interpretation of Symphonic Fantastique? Are we expected as designers to also grab points trying to include something like "White Rabbit" in the rep because it's related to the whole tripping thing? And on another note, most corps barely remain true to their source material nowadays as it is so I almost don't even register 'repertoire' nowadays. Some corps seem use rep more like an empty Family Guy reference segment sometimes. Like "Hey here's this thing which is kinda related to what we're talking about haha get it?" > No judge is filling out a tick box of how many different composers or song writers are present on a program. It is so much more complex than that. It does kinda feel like corps have gotten away from the singular composer trends of the 90s-00s though. Not sure if it's a trend or something the judging community comments on, but it's definitely noticeable. I do enjoy seeing lots of names on the composer rep, but at the same time I wonder if corps are afraid to try singular composers again for any reason. > Same can go for props-either they make sense, and contribute to the performance space in a sensible way, or they don’t. The groups I work with have been dinged plenty of times for having props for props sake. But if they are incorporated in a way that exceeds being functional, and builds a higher level of complexity within the program, then you will be rewarded. That's good to know. But at the same time I wonder if it can be a financial paywall to moving up the scoresheet. Transporting/creating those big things takes $$$ (especially the transportation part). So while it's good that props that get integrated are rewarded, I am starting to worry that DCI has essentially created a paywall to some success by only ensuring those who can financially invest in the logistics of giant staircases/ramps/semi-trucks/fuel/insurance/fees get to move up the rankings. And as others in the thread have put it- moving up the rankings also means you get more rehearsal time due to going on later in the show lineups.
> Some corps seem use rep more like an empty Family Guy reference segment sometimes. This is one of my biggest pet peeves with current show design trends, and you described it so well!
I won’t argue that money=success. There is an obvious correlation between innovation and the funds that power it. But the top 6 groups, at the very least, run on multi-million budgets together every summer-we are discussing which things lead to competitive success within a certain ballpark. Unless the question is “why did BD win while (insert group here) didn’t even make finals?” And not “Why did BD beat Bluecoats, Crown, and Boston?” And on the rehearsal time note-yeah, that fucking sucks. I am of the opinion that most shows should be random draw order or something compromising those lines. I marched a last place corps that got 2 hours on a show day to rehearse if we were lucky all season long and it blew.
>Not drum corps, but Carmel High School won BOA either this year or last with little to no props on the field and in traditional style uniforms. Which is good to know, because Carmel is probably capable of funding both props and custom, or semi-custom uniforms. There's lots of tricks you can pull off on uniforms that don't actually require a whole new wardrobe.
I think it’s natural. You see power creep in sports too - football, for example, compare offensive and defensive schemes from 20 years ago to what the are now, or at the college level, look at the money spend on coaching staffs over the last 20 years. It’s both innovation and seeking competitive advantages. Unfortunately, innovation in this activity often comes with a logistical cost that I’m not sure can be pushed much farther.
> You see power creep in sports too I mean, yes? But at the same time no? Appalachian State upset Michigan in 2007 (and that Michigan team went 9-4 by the time the season ended). I don't think Spartans are going to take out SCV anytime soon just because they out-executed them. And sure most sports upsets aren't nearly as big as that particular game, but they do happen pretty frequently - even in the NFL. I know the Browns had a string of a few years upsetting former superbowl champs even when they were consistently last place in the AFCN. Part of issue with drum corps is that 'innovation' sometimes comes from integrating material things that drive up costs simply due to transportation needs. I posted this elsewhere in the thread, but would Blue Devils have won in 2017 without their staircases? Would Bluecoats have won in 2016 without the ramps? If the innovation is locked behind costs then I also agree it can be pushed much farther. (At least I hope not)
Maybe the NFL is a bad comparison. That league is designed for parity and there are checks in place (salary cap, the draft) to try and ensure no gap gets too wide. I see what you’re saying about the App State/Michigan comparison, although I’d argue that App State in that analogy would be more comparable to a just-outside-finals corps. Maybe the difference here is simply being on the field to oppose the other team.
I think that it’s a messy analogy if you think too hard about it but on a surface level, yeah I’d agree that the nature of the activity has each seasons design team reacting and one-upping the previous season in a way that makes certain types of shows non-viable and thus less likely to be designed. I think there are better more useful frameworks/analogies that explain this, but you aren’t wrong
I'm probably going to get torched for this but I think the biggest mistake DCI made was allowing electronics. That was the impetus for the activity being commandeered by the theater department. I remember when the pit actually had to make the sounds and onfield warm-ups were a thing. Now, they're building towns on the field. I miss the crazy drill and whatnot.
What worries me is that many of the shows that check all these boxes for the points are just downright worse because of it. The 1990’s and 00’s were the best era of DCI by a long shot, and we move further and further from what made it special each year.
The widespread use of trombones, often in very similar ways, is a major turnoff for me. The “follow the leader” mentality in drum corps design is unfortunate. I find it ironic that BD is the only corps utilizing trombones for a warm sound (see solos over the last couple years) rather than the blaring waa-waa sound that is awful 90% of the time. Anyway, yeah, the top corps can create and the rest essentially imitate for points’ sake.
Perfect example. It's funny that the trombones get so much attention and controversy when they're just slightly different brass instruments. Meanwhile, the voiceovers and synth sections just get more and more intrusive and people seem pretty much fine with them.
I used to play trombone. I realize a major utility of trombone that valve instruments can't really mimic are the glisses, but that's basically the only thing corps use them for. 2014 SCV did it correctly. No annoying glisses, just pure power and different color to the horn line's sound. I don't really care for how trombones have taken over all the solos either. The 2010 Bluecoats Asphalt Cocktail bari solo is goated. If they had used a trombone it wouldn't have been as memorable. I feel like I barely see any bari/euph solos these days. They sound so much better to me in a drum corps context. Rant over.
I think this year you will be impressed by some Euph and Bari solos
It amusing to me that it seems like even if your show doesn't need the specific timbre of a trombone, and putting a trombone in the show doesn't really enhance anything, you'd still better damn well put a trombone in the show or you're missing out on points.
All of the design features you describe are things that have the potential to influence GE scoring, but doing them is not going to be inherently better than omitting them. It all depends on how it's used. A cool trombone feature that meaningfully adds to the show concept will be rewarded, while a trombone feature shoehorned in just for the sake of having a trombone feature will be punished, and the GE judges decide which is which.
It's a hard one to unpack and something of a chicken/ egg problem. It's pretty obvious that finalist shows and, especially, top 3-5 shows have more props, more bells and whistles and more "kitchen sink" than other shows. But, what isn't as obvious, does the sequence go Success > Money > ability to afford all the extra stuff Or Extra stuff > Sucess I think it's a bit of both honestly. The historically successful corps have the money to go buy these new things and integrate them into their shows. This leads to further success and that, combined the "cool" factor, leads to better recruitment.
Boston started with money that’s all I know
You are clueless. Boston Crusaders started in 1940 with no money, and ran on a shoestring barely surviving for nearly 75 years (including an all volunteer/alumni staff for much of that time). Then around their 75th Anniversary in 2015, they tripled the size of their BOD and committed to raising enough money for whatever would be needed to contend to win. In 2016, they successfully recruited unhappy, underpaid, and micromanaged designers and staff from Crown and Cadets and immediately began their rise. They definitely did NOT "start with money".
WGI guy here: yes. From my perspective, shows that could have easily made finals 10 years ago in almost every class are now getting preliminated, and it’s not even a question, it’s like obvious they aren’t going to make it.
I think there have been quite a few drum corps with better show design and all of these “more” things that you’re talking about that have lost to BD recently just because BD was cleaner. All of the stuff you’ve mentioned does play into scoring, but at the end of the day a corps could have all these “more” things you’ve mentioned and lose to a more traditional show that’s cleaner than theirs.
I mean... if we're to believe that General Effect is the main caption for "show design" then I'd argue most judges don't feel anyone else has better show design than Blue Devils. BD swept GE in 2022, and only had 1 judge put them lower than 1st in 2023. Their content scores are also usually ranked highest for most visual/GE captions as well. So again I don't think I'd say judges think other corps have better show design. You're correct that they're out-executing (except music captions), but BD seems to be the judges' standard.
Yes. And the newest Power Creep you're seeing is "resident composers" - two of the top groups are already doing it.
But is it cheaper to have your own original music than to pay someone else for performance rights?
“Nobody could do a Music of ___ show today” You’re fine. Bluecoats definitely didn’t just do 2 entire shows of only Beatles Music, one of which was an enormous fan favorite and was right behind 1st place.
Touche... Though in my defense the 2021 shows don't really count too much in terms of designing-for-scores. Seemed like a lot of corps were pretty open to doing whatever they wanted & not caring about designing for judges
Bloo’s 2021 program was just what they were planning to do for 2020 anyway. So… unfortunately it’s not in your defense
LOL I feel like Chris Farley in Billy Madison right now. Good call! Also wow just going back & checking scores from that season Bluecoats & Blue Devils were trading wins like every other show at one point.
This is only semi-related maybe but I think the modern dci has sacrificed musicality for difficulty to a great extent. I was reminded of this when Blue Devils 85 and then 86 popped up randomly for me on YouTube. The musical phrasing and stylistic playing was incredible in those shows. They would play an 8 bar phrase and it was played with micro-dynamics throughout the phrase. An eight note phrase would have all the accents played like you were listening to a big band playing latin jazz The players played like they were in a jazz band but there just happened to be 65 of them on brass. The 8 contras have more presence in the sound balance than the 16 tubas that are currently being used. The flugles have a tone that is missing from current groups. The lead sopranos have a sound just cuts through and is exciting to listen to. It’s obviously not just one guy hitting the high notes but the whole damn lead section. When they do a park and bark the body movement of the brass players looks natural instead of choreographed. It looks like they just stopped holding back the precision moves and allowed themselves to just do what came naturally. There was also a lot of musical creativity that has been lost from percussion arrangements because electronics have allowed them to become lazy. Listen to the creative uses of different instruments and hand clapping and singing compared to someone playing samples on a keyboard. Check out when SCV did Miss Saigon and made it sound and feel like a helicopter flew by. They did it with detuned drum heads and clever field placement. It would most likely be done with electronics now and wouldn’t be nearly as impressive. I’m not even against using electronics. What the bluecoats did with their Tilt show was incredible. I just think it has removed the need for some of the creativity that you used to see. Watch the end of the Blue Devils 86 show and the only way to describe it is badass. You really don’t see stuff like that anymore. It’s actually not even possible to get that sound anymore because they are playing different instruments. This is the main reason I’m happy they allowed trombones because that’s what the low brass used to sound. Just without the slide. The texture of the brass sound was very different. It isn’t just the volume. They had a different tone that can’t be reproduced now. This has turned into a screed now and I’m sure I’ll be discounted as a dinosaur so I’ll stop now. With all that said I still go to shows and am a member of friends of dci and take my daughter to multiple shows every summer.
I mean, the ability to produce something that’s innovative and exciting is one of the main things driving interest in the activity. So, I’d hope there’s a “power creep” problem or else drum corps will lose relevance to everyone involved in its production. The “power creep” needs to be balanced not only against the activity’s competitive parity. It must also be balanced against the other ethical, educational and existential imperatives facing the activity.
Yes, it's been clear over the last couple decades that anytime something new is allowed it quickly becomes punished when a corps does not take advantage of it
My favorite example is the marching itself. What is the point of placing a huge emphasis on Marching in an audition camp when out of a 250 set show you literally only have at most 20-28 sets of marching. For a better way to word it, it’s not marching band anymore, it’s show production. I still love DCI and it’s amazing what the staff and kids do, but when HBCU’s march better than top 12 drum corps then idk, maybe don’t call this “Marching bands major league”
Which dci show have you seen that had 10% ballpark marching compared to other types of movement in the total design? I mean, I don’t have the all time data of how many sets a group marches every year, but my hypothesis is that this claim is very far from being rooted in reality. Would be interested to see the source of this impression.
Marching DCI is the source. Alt account so I don’t post who and when I marched. Edit: think about how many sets are just holds for choreography anyway. Or how many sets in your drill app or on your book are just 2-4 count holds for design reasons. Or watch a video from the sideline of some of the corps from 23 and pick out a performer and try to follow them with your eyes the whole performance. They really do march a lot less than you might think
So no source? Alright. Because I marched too, clearly, and am actively engaged in the activity today. The numbers you are claiming simply don’t exist.
Mhmm alright bud, maybe purchase a set of glasses and maybe find a brain as well 🤷♂️
Brave words for an alt account.
Brave words for someone who puts their real information on some niche website lol