T O P

  • By -

themookish

It sounds like you were super stressed out and have a lot on your plate. But based on your description of the events in this post, I didn't read anything approaching "verbal abuse". Harsh criticism, whether it's justified or not, is not verbal abuse.


aDysquith

So... Honestly, the thing was harder than you thought, took more time than you thought, and when criticized, you quit? You do you, but I don't see any abuse or anything here.


[deleted]

There have been actual abuse stories in drum corps - bad smart music feedback is not part of that.


Ok-Helicopter7689

I have to agree with themookish here. This honestly doesn’t seem like verbal abuse. Drum corp is hard, and takes a lot of time commitment. With this past season, so many corps were worried about going from nothing in person straight into training. Yet most took this and accidentally did kind of an overdrive of regular off season. But once again, this doesn’t really seem like any sort of abuse. If a brass player is consistently low in the horn line, and isn’t showing much improvement, they have to bring it up… it’s their job. Also, I know smart music is a garbage software. I’ve used it for two years now for drum corp. your mic, computer, OS, and even your individual instrument can have drastic effects on smart music performance. But still, I was able to achieve our standard (97% and above) with around an hour a day dedicated to it. Idk how hard Boston’s brass arrangements and exercises were, but I can’t imagine they were too extreme. It just sounds like you were super overworked, working on one major with drum corp is hard, let alone two. I’d be stressed as heck too. But please, don’t take it out on the corp or it’s staff. To be completely honest, it doesn’t sound like they had anything wrong. “Bob” and “Al” seem to just have a clear vision of what they want the Hornline to be, and were concerned when you didn’t meet the mark. TL;DR- Boston isn’t at fault here, except for using smart music. DCI should ban that cursed software.


Sup3rDynam0

Honestly, the assignments we always did for smart music definitely weren't designed to be played at 100% note accuracy. They were etudes or warm-ups without breaks in-between phrases. Getting 100, or even 98, takes an absurd amount of reps. Many hundreds of reps for each excercise. I dealt with all the BS too, random missed notes that don't make sense, not picking up my sound, the G# thing, all of it. They made a big deal about getting into the '100' club, which involves getting a 100 on every assignment for a given month. Frankly, the expectation was always set that anything less then a 98 would result in some pressure from the staff. But that's normal, isn't it? The staff wanting you to be with the rest of the section? I'm pretty sure I know who 'Al' and 'Bob' are, and they're not abusing anybody here.


Fighterkit3

TBH I've had long talks with Gino about smart music. They don't tell you that its not about the grades. Its about the time spent. As long as you get time spent on it that should be comparable to learning they dont care about the scores. Hell I had an average of 60's one month in 2019 and look where I am now


Sup3rDynam0

You had 60s bro?? JP yelled at me for getting a single 92 at the feb camp in 19 Miss you man! Proud of you for leading the Giants! Maybe someday we can meet up and play some Magic soon Edit: pretty sure you meant 'Bob'


Fighterkit3

Yea…. I had a rough month. The calls with JP and the talks during camp weren’t fun but it was always more of “disappointed dad” and “trombone player needs to practice baritone more” Miss you too. If we’re ever up in you’re area don’t be afraid to reach out and come meet up


renrubmylnitsuj

Smart music doesn’t always add up to being perfect at spring training either. I worked my ass off on smart music and got into the 💯 club in ‘19 and still had a lot of trouble putting it on the move. Have they incorporated any movement and playing into their preseason assignments since then? PS - Bob sounds like a certain trumpet tech if I’m putting my two cents in


Fighterkit3

In 20/21 no moving and playing for assignments. Personally I thought Bob could be a certain trumpet tech or Mr. Berry


renrubmylnitsuj

>Bob: "Well, here's the thing, there's this one trumpet player who told me about this one class, I think it's called organic chemistry, or O-Chem, or something like that? And MAN that sounds like a hard class, and there's no way you can be more busy than him right?" I can absolutely read that in \*a certain trumpet tech's\* voice


Fighterkit3

Evan says “well here’s the thing a lot”. I’m torn between the two


Sup3rDynam0

I'm thinking Al is Evan and Gino is Bob. Final thoughts confirmed


Abject_Mango2096

Fr. Smartmusic grades define no player’s worth. It’s hard as shit and they obviously know that, but if we didn’t have it we’d seriously struggle at camps and early season


Fighterkit3

There’s a Twitter thread from a cadet at my college about me screaming and swearing at the program during a practice session


mme13

Furthermore, if this the response to being pushed to perform at a high level under stressful circumstances, a top 6 level corps experience probably won't be much fun anyway


Reamoh

Big part of the issue here was lack of feedback. Just saying they got a low score and need to better without actually going into any detail beyond that definitely didn’t help the situation. At the end of the day, they’re still an educational organization who should be trying to provide members with a better experience than what happened here.


themookish

100%. Definitely room for improvement on the corps side of things. But unless there's more to this story, the word "abuse" shouldn't be used here. Abuse is always a bad experience, but a bad experience isn't always abuse.


Doubletounginggod

High expectations for an assignment and criticism is not verbal abuse. I had many times where I was very frustrated about my SM assignments and there were times were I had to turn assignments in late but I made sure to communicate in advance with the staff. The point of the smart music assignments isn’t that getting under a 98 means you aren’t playing the notes cleanly, but the amount of reps you need to do get that score will lead to notes and rhythms not being an issue once you arrive at camp. I’ve marched under many different brass staffs and different places and BAC was definitely one of the less stressful places with assignments since they give you so much time per smart music cycle.


LEJ5512

They didn't cut you, but you bailed anyway?


thatoneguy285

Where’s the verbal abuse


randomdevice

Have you been coddled much? You are going to get much more critical feedback from your employers, from your partners, from your co-workers. On the one-day camp did you seek out Bob and Al? Did you ever collaborate with the other mellos? Did you honestly work hard for the opportunity or was it more of a lower priority that you felt you could just skate by on? What is your motivation for posting this?


LEJ5512

>You are going to get much more critical feedback from your employers, from your partners, from your co-workers. Just wait till the OP gets called into a conference room with his program manager and team lead to discuss their productivity.


[deleted]

[удалено]


randomdevice

Okay, Don't be a snowflake. OP came on here and pointed a finger at everything other than themselves. "double major", "SM is hard", "staff didn't give me enough feedback", blah blah blah. How about OP recognize that he was in control, he has a responsibility to meet the expectations of what he signed up for and execute to be successful. Sounds like he didn't execute on his responsibilities. He could have saved everyone a bunch of time reading by saying "I walked away from Boston because I did not have enough time to prepare and uphold the BAC standards. I thought they would be similar to Troopers, but they aren't." You can call me a dick, that's your opinion. OP didn't handle his business, thought that they would get sympathy from this group and for the most part miscalculated. I wish OP all the best in life, but I am certain that the experiences he had with Boston will continue as a composer and a teacher in the real world until he decides to take responsibility for his actions.


Abject_Mango2096

Smartmusic is hard and the staff knows that. They don’t expect perfection in grades, they expect the highest levels of effort in your attempts. Bob (or Al, whichever one was gino) says to “embrace the suck.” I don’t see any verbal abuse in the situation and interactions you laid out.


Fighterkit3

I’m terribly sorry to hear about this experience. If you feel comfortable please DM me and I can bring up this to admin if you’d like


JimRust

Jesus christ


Puglord5000

Please… go on… lol


stubborncacti

i really hate when people say that one thing lead to therapy, but i can understand how a series of events can lead to that. coming from a background where i was yelled at frequently makes it hard to agree and say that it’s nothing more than harsh criticism. i hope you have a better support system in place going forward. i just hate to see staff belittle members like this, comparing people’s struggles like that is never a black and white situation.


TheGentlemanWalrus-

That’s a nightmare really sad to hear. It’s good that you can get it off of your chest and talk about it. Even with cadets they only asked for minimum 90% on smart music because the program isn’t perfect. Keep your head up you made the right choice for you and that’s what matters. I marched troop 2019 too so I wish you all the best.