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#TeamTexas at WGI 2017!


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Despite how I harp on Texas groups during the marching season about their visual packages, even I have to admit that Texas groups have come a looooong way. And their always improving color guards have a lot to do with it! Where would Texas bands be without these wonderful young performers?

 

So, I've decided to start a thread (probably in the wrong section) to discuss how excited I am to see Texas winter guards compete this season at WGI, and also to create a space to discuss the winter guard season in general. Texas will be VERY well represented this year at the WGI World Championships. For those who don't know, Texas winter guard had something of a banner year last year in the form of the James Bowie World Class Winter Guard. After Bowie placed 4th in the Scholastic Open Class in 2015, Joey Powell, the director at Bowie, self-promoted the group to the World Class for 2016, and the group proceeded to completely shatter expectations, placing third in semi-finals over the likes of well-oiled guard machines Avon, Flanagan, and James Logan. Bowie ended up dropping to 5th in finals, but it was still far and away the best showing ever by a Texas group in the Scholastic World Class. Their show last year, The Anarchy of Silence, is maybe the best-designed show I've seen in the Scholastic World Class since the Scott Chandler days at James Logan, and it was such a tricky thing to pull off. Sure, Tarpon Springs outclassed the competition from a skills and performance perspective, but I definitely preferred Bowie's show. I am so excited to see how much they've grown this season. I hope they continue to break the mold!

 

Also competing in the Scholastic World Class for the first time since 2006 is The Woodlands World Guard. This group has seen a meteoric rise the past couple of years. Honestly, somebody should give their director, Cyndi Robbins, a cookie (or better yet, a pay raise) because I have NEVER seen a group go from non-finals-worthy A Class group to finals-worthy World Class group in 1 and 1/2 winter guard seasons. In 2015, Ms. Robbins' first year with the group, the guard started its season by dominating the A Class, was seeded first nationally, was promoted to the Open Class, and proceeded to make finals in the Open Class. In 2016, the group dominated the Open Class, would have been ranked first nationally, if it had gone to the World Championship, and became the first group ever to be promoted to the World Class mid-season. At the Southwestern Power Regional, the guard placed 2nd to Bowie and beat out 3 other groups, including the NEISD Guard by over 3 points. (The NEISD Guard, another outstanding group, went on to make finals at the World Championships.) Needless to say, I'm very excited to see how The Woodlands does this year with a show that's designed for the class that they end their season in. Their shows the past two years have been beautifully expressive, and almost a little poetic in the way that they seem to tell the future.

 

Obviously, I'm very excited about the World groups, but Texas isn't slouching in the other classes. Both Little Elm and Eastlake will return in the Open Class, where they placed 4th and 7th last year. I especially loved Eastlake's show, which was very Texan and very kitschy, and I mean that in a good way! In the A Class, the always strong Americas will be making an appearance, as well as the Dawson A Guard, which is currently ranked first in the nation, albeit only 1 week into the season.

 

And then of course all of the Independent groups.

 

It's going to be a great season. Best of luck to all!

 

 

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Despite how I harp on Texas groups during the marching season about their visual packages, even I have to admit that Texas groups have come a looooong way. And their always improving color guards have a lot to do with it! Where would Texas bands be without these wonderful young performers?

 

So, I've decided to start a thread (probably in the wrong section) to discuss how excited I am to see Texas winter guards compete this season at WGI, and also to create a space to discuss the winter guard season in general. Texas will be VERY well represented this year at the WGI World Championships. For those who don't know, Texas winter guard had something of a banner year last year in the form of the James Bowie World Class Winter Guard. After Bowie placed 4th in the Scholastic Open Class in 2015, Joey Powell, the director at Bowie, self-promoted the group to the World Class for 2016, and the group proceeded to completely shatter expectations, placing third in semi-finals over the likes of well-oiled guard machines Avon, Flanagan, and James Logan. Bowie ended up dropping to 5th in finals, but it was still far and away the best showing ever by a Texas group in the Scholastic World Class. Their show last year, The Anarchy of Silence, is maybe the best-designed show I've seen in the Scholastic World Class since the Scott Chandler days at James Logan, and it was such a tricky thing to pull off. Sure, Tarpon Springs outclassed the competition from a skills and performance perspective, but I definitely preferred Bowie's show. I am so excited to see how much they've grown this season. I hope they continue to break the mold!

 

Also competing in the Scholastic World Class for the first time since 2006 is The Woodlands World Guard. This group has seen a meteoric rise the past couple of years. Honestly, somebody should give their director, Cyndi Robbins, a cookie (or better yet, a pay raise) because I have NEVER seen a group go from non-finals-worthy A Class group to finals-worthy World Class group in 1 and 1/2 winter guard seasons. In 2015, Ms. Robbins' first year with the group, the guard started its season by dominating the A Class, was seeded first nationally, was promoted to the Open Class, and proceeded to make finals in the Open Class. In 2016, the group dominated the Open Class, would have been ranked first nationally, if it had gone to the World Championship, and became the first group ever to be promoted to the World Class mid-season. At the Southwestern Power Regional, the guard placed 2nd to Bowie and beat out 3 other groups, including the NEISD Guard by over 3 points. (The NEISD Guard, another outstanding group, went on to make finals at the World Championships.) Needless to say, I'm very excited to see how The Woodlands does this year with a show that's designed for the class that they end their season in. Their shows the past two years have been beautifully expressive, and almost a little poetic in the way that they seem to tell the future.

 

Obviously, I'm very excited about the World groups, but Texas isn't slouching in the other classes. Both Little Elm and Eastlake will return in the Open Class, where they placed 4th and 7th last year. I especially loved Eastlake's show, which was very Texan and very kitschy, and I mean that in a good way! In the A Class, the always strong Americas will be making an appearance, as well as the Dawson A Guard, which is currently ranked first in the nation, albeit only 1 week into the season.

 

And then of course all of the Independent groups.

 

It's going to be a great season. Best of luck to all!

Love watching Winterguard!!  And I guess that Flo Marching will stream some of the WGI competitions, so I guess I'll have to fire up my subscription again!  :0

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Big day for WGI. Lots of contests all over the place (including Dallas), which should provide a little bit of evidence about how everyone stacks up. Unfortunately, it looks like Bowie might have withdrawn from the Dallas regional. I'm wondering if the cost of paint had anything to do with it! Very Bishop Kearney '96-ish, by the way, although I'm confident that Bowie can update the concept in a way that's fresh and interesting. Be sure to donate if you can!

 

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A fine performance from Carmel at the Indianapolis regional. Love the swing sets. Very playful. Definitely the standout for me, although I wasn't a huge fan of the SW shows in general. (To be fair, I'm usually not.)

 

Pride of Cincinnati was typically excellent. I could do with a little less talking in the soundtrack, as I think the music is quite interesting (much more so than the Nico Muhly piece they performed last year), but it could grow on me. I think the white, PVC pipe room that gets moved around the floor is brilliant. It's like a movable jungle gym that the performers climb all over. It creates some very interesting visual moments.

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  • 2 weeks later...

It looks like Bowie is going the Onyx route with their costumes. Same costumes as last year, I think. Lots of white again -- the costumes, the floor, the ramp in the back. They're risking a bit of sameness here. It's a very gentle show, performed to the William Wordsworth poem, Intimations of Immortality. I probably could have used a little bit more bite, to be honest, but I still enjoyed it. A few key drops, and a few moments where the guard really wasn't performing quite cohesively as an ensemble, but nothing too major. Not a bad performance for their first major contest. Apparently the paint will be coming later, if it comes at all. One thing is for sure, though: this show is absolutely nothing like Bishop Kearney's show so far, which is good!

 

The Woodlands has the most confrontationally feminist show I've seen in a while. The audio track is an odd, but interesting mix of Blondie's Heart of Glass, a chamber string piece, and sound bites from women. "Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard," it starts, as the girls are behind a line of prison bars. "You're pretty good for a girl," another says. Like Bowie, there were a bit more performance lapses than I was expecting, but solid overall. Movement was their Achilles' heel at the last contest they attended. I can kind of see why. There's a bit more hesitancy than there should be, and the phrases aren't really connecting organically. Something to hit hard, although I think the show itself is quite fine. Certainly among the more engaging ones I've seen.

 

I'll be surprised if they're both not in finals at World, although I'm hesitant to predict the sort of success that Bowie saw last year. Still, I'm excited to see how both grow throughout the season.

 

Edit: Wordsworth, not Woodsworth.

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"Victoria Page will not dance the dance of The Red Shoes TONIGHT!" Oh, my. It looks like Onyx has taken the hint and done something completely left of center this year. When's the last time an Onyx show had you smiling and laughing? Anybody? Crickets? I love how the guy strips off the typical Onyx uniform in the beginning. Then the rest of the guard also proceeds to get *quite* naked. It's a veritable cabaret-esque striptease. It's also quite queer, with men strutting around in high heels, performing phrases from Beyonce's now legendary Single Ladies dance. Work it! I'm loving this, although I have to admit it feels like stuff I've seen before -- off the top of my head, Cypress Independent's 2015 show. This one, however, is a bit more... charged.

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Loved Hendrickson's show. Beautiful rendition of Bob Dylan's Blowin' in the Wind. Full guard weapon features always impress me. It's a bigger investment from a pedagogical standpoint. There are scholastic world guards out there with only 5 or 6 members of their guard doing weapon work. Something to keep in mind. I think Hendrickson's performance was cleaner than Little Elm's, although the skills were a bit more advanced in Little Elm's show. I can see why the two groups were so close in prelims.

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There's the paint. Bowie was saving it for finals. And now I know why everything is so white, because they get it all over the floor, themselves, and the flags. Definitely haven't seen anything quite like that before. Very clever idea. Performance-wise, I'd say it was about the same as it was in prelims, which will be more than enough for them to win this contest. The Woodlands seemed a bit off in finals. Prelims was much better for them. Opening with a drop never helps!

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Loved Hendrickson's show. Beautiful rendition of Bob Dylan's Blowin' in the Wind. Full guard weapon features always impress me. It's a bigger investment from a pedagogical standpoint. There are scholastic world guards out there with only 5 or 6 members of their guard doing weapon work. Something to keep in mind. I think Hendrickson's performance was cleaner than Little Elm's, although the skills were a bit more advanced in Little Elm's show. I can see why the two groups were so close in prelims.

 

And Hendrickson did come out on top!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Lots of Power Regionals today. Guards should really have their stuff together by this point, as there are only a couple of weeks left before the World Championship.

 

I was super impressed by Trumbull. The show is called "2017" and is performed to a cover of David Bowie's "Life on Mars?". There's a little girl staring at a TV at the front right corner of the floor the whole time. I'm not sure I understand exactly what this show is about (being consumed by the media?), but man, can those girls spin. And toss. And move. This is what a world class guard should look like. I strongly suspect they'll be around the top 5 at Worlds.

 

I was also reasonably impressed by Cape Fear. I'm not a big fan of the music (there's a very awful, metal-ish cover of "The Sound of Silence" towards the end), but I respect the quality of the performers. Lots of prison bars. It's very reminiscent of The Woodlands' show this year, which might not be so favorable to The Woodlands.

 

I thought Marcus had a very fun and cute show. I absolutely loved the concept and all of those magic tricks, although I might have chosen different music. "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" only really works because of that one line; it's essentially a song about love and desire, and the show didn't seem to have any of those elements.

 

The Woodlands has improved since last time, and there have been several changes to the show, including what seems to be an extended ending. Honestly, I still think the ending needs work, as it just doesn't have that air of finality. I'm not sure what they could do. Maybe the girls could topple over the bars with some sort of crash as the soloist catches that last toss? I don't know. More than anything, they should be focused on getting it clean and infusing some energy into the performance. They're going to be right on the border of making finals at worlds, probably, which is somewhat disappointing, given that last year's show would have made finals comfortably.

 

No paint again in prelims for James Bowie, but they didn't need it. Far and away the best scholastic guard at the contest. There's just something about the way that they move that sets them apart from everyone else, and it's apparent from the very first few phrases, as the guard has its legs in the air and begins to rummage about like little woodland creatures. And the performance is so much better than it was two weeks ago at WGI Austin. The show is really coming together, and I can't wait to see how it does at World!

 

I was able to catch a few guards in the Open Class at the Southwest Regional as well. I absolutely loved Eastlake's show, which is based on Copland conducting a performance of Appalachian Spring, and I think it should have been closer to Hendrickson. Eastlake's show is a more cerebral sort of show, whereas Hendrickson's is very obviously pretty and affecting, which probably helped Hendrickson. Certainly, I would have had Eastlake above Bellevue West, whose movement was arresting, but whose equipment skills left a bit to be desired. I *did* like Bellevue's West use of MJ's "Dirty Diana" and the show's horror/Teen Wolf-style elements, and am left wondering if BW came out over Eastlake mainly because BW's show was so viscerally entertaining.

 

Edit: Life ON Mars. Typos galore.

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I forgot to add, I also saw the Klein Oak guard, which came out on top in the A Class. I thought it was very well-done. A very pretty show, although they relied a bit heavily on the lone guy member of the team. It seemed like most of the most difficult skills were performed by him. The rest of the guard was excellent, too, but it was definitely something that was more noticeable than in other guards. Then again, the show *was* called Jamie, and so I'd assume that the lone male guard member was playing the lead role.

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I didn't watch finals, but poring over the recaps, I'm seeing (mostly) what I expected. Glad to see that Invictus' score of 69 in prelims was due to a 10 point penalty. It would have been *quite* baffling otherwise. I'm also happy to see Trumbull break 85. That's where their score should be. A real boffo score. I'm thinking it'll be Carmel, James Logan, Avon, Flanagan, and Trumbull in the top 5, but who knows. Flanagan is probably the only World Class guard I haven't seen. As far as the TX groups go, I'm happy that the world guards apparently gave better performances in finals this time! I'm definitely happy that Bowie cracked 80. Only a very small handful of guards are going to do that before the World Championship. I'm also somewhat heartened by the fact that The Woodlands was in the upper 70s for their vocabulary, composition, and repertoire scores, since those are harder to fix. The show is fine (if lacking a bit of subtlety), and they're doing very difficult things, but the execution needs to be there. They've got a couple weeks. I've got my fingers crossed.

 

In the Open Class, I'm seeing pretty much what I expected. GE judges seemed a bit divided on Eastlake, with half seeing it the way I saw it, and the other half, not so much. Bellevue West was first across the board in movement in both rounds. Not at all surprising. That was so obviously their strength, and they put a lot of World Class groups to shame. What was a bit surprising for me were the high equipment scores. To each her own, although I didn't see the finals performance, so I can't comment on that. Meanwhile, Hendrickson seems well-positioned to medal at the World Championship. We might have a new World Class guard in Texas soon. We'll see!

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David Bowie's explanation of his song (lifted from Wikipedia) might shed some light on Trumbull's concept:

 

Bowie, at the time of Hunky Dory's release in 1971, summed up the
song as "A sensitive young girl's reaction to the media." In 1997, he
added "I think she finds herself disappointed with reality... that
although she's living in the doldrums of reality, she's being told that
there's a far greater life somewhere, and she's bitterly disappointed
that she doesn't have access to it."

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Some absolutely stunning photos from the Southwest Regional are available over at Zach Ashcraft's website, for those who are interested: http://zachashcraft.com/wgidenton

 

Here are a few.

 

C7p9r1xVUAAoFDA.jpg

 

Klein Oak. "Don't leave me, Jamie!"

 

 

C7N73FRXwAAru20.jpg

 

More Klein Oak. That can't be easy!

 

 

C7lFRJlVUAABU4y.jpg

 

Bellevue West. If ya got it, flaunt it.

 

 

C7Y4mOqW4AAH344.jpg

 

More Bellevue West. Because they've obviously got it.

 

 

C7lC8GeVQAA8Un0.jpg

 

Wolves with great hair.

 

 

C7Zb0lHX0AAl3qZ.jpg

 

The Woodlands. Guilty until proven innocent.

 

 

C7QN4KrVwAEbLIt.jpg

 

More The Woodlands. Pretty good for girls.

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Carmel absolutely nailed their preliminary performance at the Southeast Power Regional. I don't think there's really any competition for them at Worlds this year. Maybe James Logan, whose show is stirring and politically-minded, but probably not. Carmel's show is too elegant and too well-performed to be topped.

 

Pride of Cincinnati will be similarly dominant in the Independent World Class, unless Aimachi is better than ever. It wasn't the best preliminary run for POC, but the show is so well put-together that it didn't matter. I *do* love Onyx's show, and it might end up being my favorite of the year, but it lacks focus (probably intentionally, but that doesn't change the fact that it lacks focus).

 

All in all, it'll end up being another great year for Michael Gaines, who's probably the closest thing the marching arts has to a genius.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Prelims underway in Dayton. Great scores for Dawson and Allen so far in Scholastic A. (Allen is currently the top scoring group across both prelims venues.) In Scholastic Open, Little Elm has come out on top among the Texas groups with an 89.7, although it might be a bit of an uphill battle into the top 3. A lot of groups are in the running for that. Hendrickson is one of them. Eastlake should be good for finals. In Scholastic World, Bowie should be safe for finals. They're at 11th after prelims, and they take 15. The Woodlands has an uphill battle. They have to beat 3 groups that beat them (although not by much) in semifinals to make the finals. Given how WGI schedules the groups in reverse placement order, that could be difficult. In other news, Carmel has proven what should have been obvious to everyone: that they're far and away the best scholastic guard in the world this year. They scored over 95 in prelims. I can't recall the last time I've seen a score that high after prelims in the Scholastic World class. They might become the first guard to crack a 98 in finals, since James Logan last did it in 2005. It would be well-earned. Arabesque is an outstanding show any way you look at it. It's also the only show that made me say, "Wow!" out loud this year. (It happened when the girls put the rifles on the swings, swung them back, retrieved them from behind, tossed them way up over the swing sets, went under the sets, caught the rifles on the other side, and swung back playfully on their stomachs. They just *nail* it. And it's so difficult!)  Anyway, what a great year for the Carmel band and guard. Winning BOA *and* WGI.

 

I enjoyed Aimachi. Lots of baton twirling again, which makes the crowd go crazy. I don't think it'll be anywhere near enough to top Pride of Cincinnati, but we'll see!

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