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I'm considering going to Melissa prelims and Bedford finals as an option if I head up to the metroplex this weekend. Lot still depends on who goes where.

Scholastic JV Regional A - Red Round - 1. Oak Ridge High School 2. Dickinson Junior Varsity 3. CE King HS JV Blue 4. Clear Lake HS Blue 5. Elkins HS JV 6. Pasadena Memorial HS JV 7. Fulshear JV 8. Ross S. Sterling HS JV Scholastic JV Regional A - Blue Round - 1. Terry HS JV 2. JET JV 3. Deer Park HS JV 4. Magnolia HS JV 5. Brazoswood HS JV 6. Alvin HS JV 7. CE King HS JV Red 8. Clear Falls JV 9. Waller JV

Yay we back!!!

These were inevitable! Here are my predictions for GCM, classes may be separated into different posts depending on how many people are participating in the class. i'm thinking just three per post for now (JVRA is getting a post just for themselves because their class for this comp is STACKED) Cadet Novice (not too much commentary, I've never seen a cadet team): 1. George Junior High Cadets: I mean... 85.5... for a cadet team!? First comp! This is a 99.9% 1st place for them 2. Angleton Junior High School: Top 5 last year at area for their first season! 3. Friendswood Cadets: Dropped from Regional A but I still believe they have potential to medal 4: Wright Junior High School 5. E.F. Green Cadets Novice: 1. South Houston: I'm surprised they aren't promoted already!! 2. Anahuac: No dig at them, just thinking it's a transition year for them as they get settled into TCGC Cadet Regional A: 1. Madisonville Cadets

So this comp has an insane lineup already!! Will definitely be at this one now that Boa Bedford is a week earlier. Here's all the confirmed bands: North Forney JJ Pearce Byron Nelson Wylie Rock Hill Argyle Royce City Celina Lovejoy (has Don Hanna on their Calander for this weekend) Little Elm Berkner Wylie East Hebron (YES!!!!!) Plano Senior Plano East Plano West Lebanon Trail Panther Creek Independence Reedy Emerson Heritage Rockwall-Heath Rockwall Highland Park Easily the strongest lineup this comp has ever had. Have only been here for last year's finals which was great so I'm excited to be here hopefully for a full day!!!

Yeah, I might be going to Melissa now if I'm free this weekend, scared my college's alumni band day will be this weekend but you should 100% come to prosper if you can, can already promise you I will already be there

Okay so this is already my most anticipated comp of the season! Bentonville, Hebron, probably Marcus, like Cmon!! This has easily become my favorite one to attend and I have a feeling this one will be the strongest and probably one of if not the best DFW BOA comp ever. If you can be here, be here!! I promise you won't' want to miss it!

So happy they are doing this for the smaller schools!! Will be a very strong Comp!

I think Mckinney is going to Bedford now since they are making the trip to Grand Nats but if Alumni Band for my College doesn't conflict with this comp I will 100% be here, though I'm guessing it's going to be on this day Still an insane lineup!!!

Seeing Seven Lakes makes me sooooo happy! If they have another year like these last two, definitely a finalist imo!

Lumberton HS will also be getting a new head director after this current year ends, unless something has changed and he is staying.

I think the Little-Cypress program could really skyrocket with a solid new director. I’ve got my eye on them.

Northwest HS (Region 2, 6A-J) is now searching for a new head director. Job has been posted to TMEA. In addition, the position for Medina Valley Creek View (Region 11, 4A-E) has been taken off the TMEA website. No official announcements have been made by either district at this time.

The wording of D9 is certainly interesting. Some have mentioned the poor percussion judging last year, but that doesn't really explain why it singles out non-Texas educators. Is the assumption that Texas educators wouldn't make the same mistakes? If so, I find that assumption questionable. I don't remember who brought it up. There was some chatter about the shift in music performance scoring going from the old group of judges (retired Texas band directors) to the newer one (DCI/BOA/WGI). Perhaps that's part of it. I've always assumed that the shift was done to minimize the influence of in-state connections and bring in judges who work at the highest level of the marching arts and have very extensive experience in their captions. I don't see that as a bad thing, personally. I suppose the real question is, what does Texas teaching experience confer upon judges that is advantageous, specifically?

I'm not sure how long ago it changed, but Austin area groups like Cedar Park used to be in the same marching and TMEA areas as the North Houston bands. Heck, there was even that brief period where Coppell and Duncanville were in the same area for TMEA as the Spring ISD and Conroe ISD and Klein ISD schools. It seems crazy, but it HAS happened before!

I found close-up videos of Origins Open and Nova. They're both really pushing the upper limit of the Open class in individual skills. We'll see what happens. I like Nova's soundtrack a lot more than Origins'. Not a big fan of pop ballads. But Origins was a lot cleaner, on some pretty crazy skills. Did Nova form in response to the loss of Mirage and Menage? I kind of get that impression. They're VERY talented.

I can't find it. I did, however, stumble onto Tarpon Springs! https://youtu.be/oifc1DV93LQ?si=E350YSG9EwnCpi3G They're very, very good. Not clean yet, but when they get there, I could see them medaling. It's a very different show from their recent offerings. More abstract, serious, less of their typical crowd-pleaser style. I bet all the frames and cubes and whatnot look really cool from higher up. Song sounds like it's from a musical maybe. The only thing is that it's pitched at a very similar intensity from start to finish. Judges might go for something a little more varied and dynamic. That one guard guy is an ace for sure. Holy cow!

There is a video of Little Elm on Youtube of their run and it is impressive. Not shocking to see them win over Flower Mound.

So what was the issue did we ever find out....?

I'm confused about the logic on a football front too. I looked around some of the big Texas football forums but nobody seems to be mentioning what I believe to be a very odd move. Most of the focus is on the Westlake / Lake Travis split, which make sense but still.

The scores here actually look pretty similar to last year's, which is a good thing, because there were a couple Dayton medalists here last year. Wylie didn't quite reach the heights Emerson did, but they're on par with Melissa, who placed 2nd at Dayton. This will be no surprise to anyone here. We all know what the Wylie guard looked like in the fall. They were amazing. There was a bit of downward pressure in the A class in finals after you get past the top couple spots. I'm wondering if the judges kind of noticed, "Hey, we're a little high relative to the rest." Meanwhile, in Houston, the scores near the top shot up by something like 4 points. Again, probably in response to the "national" picture. (Read: the scores at this contest.) Melissa is killing it in their first year in Open. They'll be seeded 1st in the country to start off their season. Kind of crazy how frequently we've seen guards go from A to the top of Open recently. Underscores my point in the Houston thread about how A versus Open seems a grey area more and more. Marcus just looks misclassed. I don't know what else to say about that score. Heck, maybe even Origins Open, too, with an 80. That's a huge score for this class. Origins might need 2 world guards. Little Elm beating Flower Mound is a big surprise for me. Well, in equipment, FloMo had the edge, but that was it. (Those scores both look more like what I expected.) Little Elm must move very well and have a great design to do as well as they did in those captions. In fact, with this score, they're trending around Carmel, and *ahead* of The Woodlands, who only managed a 70.5 last week at TCGC, and got an unexpectedly low equipment score. Granted, TWHS did about the same as they did last year at their first TCGC event on Feb 1st, before going on to get a 98 at Dayton, so it's hard to tell. They're apparently very tortoise-y. Still, Little Elm beating TWHS is something to keep an eye on, as shocking as that would be, based on how they looked in the fall. Origins world doing great in their first year back. I've actually seen this one. Personally, I'm not in love with the design -- a little too chaotic and the color scheme is dull -- but they can spin and toss with the best of 'em.

I'm super SUPER excited for Randle! They are amazing!

YASSSSS! Let's GO! Thanks Clarinot!

This was a pretty stacked Scholastic A contest, with 4 of last year's top 10 Dayton guards competing. And, to my pleasant surprise, Jersey Village beat all of them! They're going to Dayton this year, along with Friendswood. Village is in a good place, it seems, especially after snagging 2nd in the content half of the GE sheets. They just need to clean what they have. Friendswood winning is no surprise. There are some questions as to why they're back in A. They did not do poorly in Open -- quite the opposite. At the same time, the barrier between A and Open has seemed a little porous in recent years. It's genuinely hard to tell who belongs where. I don't think I'm alone, either. Just last year the WGI steering committee declined to reclassify Emerson, who was then reclassified by NTCA based on score, according to a poster here. Emerson went on to place FIFTH in Open Class finals, which makes it seem like the WGI steering committee REALLY dropped the ball, if they were willing to let a top 5 Open class guard compete in A. Perhaps it was less obvious early season. Anyway, food for thought. TWHS A continues to do very well, and continues to outperform their content. 3 first places in the performance half of the sheets, but only 1 first place overall in equipment. They're a good skill check in this class for the other guards. Movement caption seems to be their primary weakness. Jordan, Tomball Memorial, and Katy all did very well. Katy was a late-bloomer last year. That could be the case this year. I don't think any are going to Dayton. Of last year's Dayton finalists, Dripping Springs was lowest, but still did very well. They're another one that flourished later in the season last year, if I recall correctly. Pearland wins as expected. That's a great score for Open class. To put things into perspective, Little Elm, who posted the highest ever SO score at Dayton last year, scored a 74.8 at the first regional of 2025. Cy-Fair was close, which could be good for them, because they bloomed late last season. I wasn't expecting them to be this close, honestly, especially after scoring 8 points lower just a week ago at TCGC. Just goes to show how hard it is to trust early season scores (with incomplete shows), and maybe even just how hard it is to trust TCGC scores in general sometimes. 😅 Ditto for Bridgeland. Another 8 point increase. I'll have to look up their old scores, but this score for Undaunted seems higher than usual for them. Will this be the year they make finals at Dayton? It would be so much better if we could actually watch the shows, instead of just relying on scores!

I'm just hoping area J gets broken up for the ISDs like Wylie, McKinney etc. its just so stacked and needs to be broken up...