aaron067

Full results have been posted on the MFA website. Here.

Was Marian Catholic outstanding? Yes. Was Marcus outstanding? Yes. Based on sheer execution and difficulty, who was stronger? Marcus. They aren't the 5A Texas State Champions for no reason. Did Marcus communicate the intent of their musical design well? You better believe they did. Did Marian Catholic communicate the intent of their musical design well? Maybe, but I personally found the show a tad uninteresting. That tells me they didn't sell the musical package. So, that puts Marcus ahead in Music (which should have been by a substantial margin if the judges have any kind of trained ear; did you hear their chords!?), and Music GE. That's 60% of the score. That means Marcus had abysmally low visual scores to be .75 behind Marian Catholic. Clearly the two visual judges thought they marched well, but, to be perfectly honest, I don't think Marian Catholic executed their drill at the same level Avon was at. If I had to put it into words, I would say Avon has similar refinement in their movement just as Marcus does in their music. No one else, including Marian Catholic, had that. I'll need to watch the high cam views when they become available, but, in my opinion at least, the judges made a mistake. I know we have a different way of doing things in Texas, but there are some things that should just be universal in music. If a band can execute music and marching at the level Marcus always achieves, it's going to take the very best performing at their peak to compete. Avon did that, but I don't think Marian Catholic did.

I'll mind my manners until I see the full score sheets, but I have an EXTREMELY difficult time believing that Carmel was that close to Marcus and that Marian Catholic actually placed ahead of them. On a more positive notes, ALL of the bands performed well. Congrats to each of them!

^ I agree whole-heartedly with this. I definitely appreciate the maturity of Bell, but there's just nothing comparable to the level of musical execution that Marcus produces.

It was definitely much improved. I think whitewing was referring to ensemble balance though, not section balance, which is what my volume comment was referring to.

Yeah, that's where the melody re-enters. What's wrong with the balance at that point? The trumpets are forcing their sound, and they aren't matching tone or volume, but the texture otherwise seems fine to me.

Was it something at the end of the show, or are you referring to some new additions spread throughout? I was watching, but then my laptop died right as they began the finale! Apparently the power cord wasn't 100% plugged in...

No, it isn't a pre-show, though the synthesizer is holding a drone for a while before they actually begin. There's a voice-over that has to be heard, so they're waiting until after Dan finishes his announcement. Just as a teaser, imagine the most picturesque sunrise as it peaks over the horizon. Rays of light stretch out over the landscape, illuminating and warming the morning, and the world begins to awake. For me, this is what the new opening is all about. If you're talking about the first portion of Kingfisher, that isn't an imbalance. It took me a few run-throughs to figure out that the trumpet melody is actually written out for a few bars before returning. The result is some transitional material that isn't quite clean enough to stand on its own (at least when paired with the visual demand). For me it's the only weak point in the music design, but the next section with the world percussion influences and Indian dancing totally makes up for it! I will say that my personal favorite portions of the past few days were their music rehearsals. I've never heard a marching band pour so much emotion into their music. The phrasing across the ensemble is just impeccable when they're standing in concert arcs. I think the indoor environment and the adrenaline of GN will make this aspect of their performances even more poignant, so I'm psyched to see them (along with the other Texas bands!).

I was there for the full rehearsal and performance Saturday, Monday, and Tuesday. Why do you ask?

Yeah, from what I saw in San Antonio they appear to be stock white jackets with the design painted on. That makes each jacket a bit different and is much cheaper than having new jackets designed and made. It was a very intelligent move, I think.

Any particular reason you used your first post to necro a thread that's over a year old?

Westlake incorporated a large portion of the Overture into their carnival-themed show last year with a good deal of success.

She was not judging on-field music during prelims. I know for a fact that Carl Bly was standing in front of a bassoon player holding a saxophone for most of the show so I won't dispute the reasoning; however, I would also like to point out that he pretty much stayed in the lower left quadrant of the field for most of the shows that I saw during prelims. That seems like a fairly narrow perspective on a band's individual technique, whether marching or music.

I agree with the other sentiments regarding this statement. Regardless, those people not playing are either double reed players or various freshmen. You just can't march 200 wind players in a high school band program and expect every single one of them to be playing. I believe it was 2002 when they decided to march the "competitive" number of 120, and the overall reaction from spectators was it just wasn't the same Coppell without the normal number of players on the field. With that said, I feel that it's truly unfair to dock a band a significant number of points just because you happen to be standing in front of a couple of people who aren't playing (for what amounts to about 5% of the show length from the judge's perspective). We all know that it happens in every single band out there. Looking back at Arlington, Coppell was awarded 18.40 in Individual Music during Finals and 13.60 during Prelims. That's almost 5 full points! I think we can all agree that Coppell is of a caliber that makes this type of performance discrepancy highly unlikely, even considering a switch in judges. The only other explanation is that the field judge happened to pick out a few of those people who weren't playing during prelims, but the judge during finals wasn't anywhere near them (or didn't care). So, if this discrepancy shows up between two back-to-back performances of the same band, how can we not assume that a judge is docking one band points and letting another band get away with the exact same thing just because they aren't in the right place to notice it? Now that my point is made, I'd like to say that my personal opinion is that, in an ideal world, everyone on the field should be playing. Other programs obviously find other ways to involve their double reed players, for instance, but without being able to consistently judge this aspect of a performance from the field, why is it being judged at all? Obviously there should be some type of penalty if 10-20% of a band isn't playing, but 5 or 6 out of 200?

I was thrilled that I got to see Marcus and Bell nearly back-to-back (poor Leander, sandwiched in between). Bell can obviously pull off playing their show well, but Marcus clearly has better players on the field. They present so much more control of their instruments. Tone quality, dynamics, style, everything was just executed with more maturity. Not to take anything away from Bell, though. They certainly deserved their 1st place finish when you take the entire show into account, but Marcus is in a musical league all its own. I expect Marcus to come away with the Music Caption at GN, but I'll be interested to see if Bell's emotional presence is enough to overcome Marcus in overall placement.

Sorry, I handed the sheets over to the head director this morning. The largest penalty I recall seeing was .8 (and Bell had .3 for something). I remember doing a double take when I saw Langham's rank, but it's definitely possible that I could have misread it. I was working on a 36 hour day with only a couple of cat naps on the bus to tide me over, so there's no telling what I might have seen at 11:30 last night. Westlake was definitely 26, though. I will say that I was VERY pleasantly surprised by Spring. I thought their playing was strong, and their show design seemed to be one of the most cohesive of the contest (I get into the darker ideas, so it worked well for me). I recall them having one of the highest visual GE scores in prelims, too. I was shocked that Cedar Park had average scores in music during finals after an extremely strong performance in prelims. I personally thought they were had one of the most crisp sounds of the night. The normal boominess was replaced by uncommon clarity most of the time, and I count that as a huge achievement in the dome. I'm still disappointed Coppell was one out, but maybe their design process will have taken a few leaps forward when they return in two years.

I don't know if the score sheets passed out in director packets are considered "unofficial" until Monday morning when they're posted online, but I can confirm that Westlake was 26th (which shocked me as well!). Coppell was 15th, .2 behind Reagan, who scored unusually high in music considering what their Finals performance sounded like. Langham Creek was 32nd...

I'm not going to turn this discussion into an argument by sharing my opinion, and I apologize if I seemed a bit agitated. I just see the entire post as somewhat insensitive and off-putting and ask that he put a bit more forethought into his comments regarding the performances of other people.

I think the point some people are trying to make is that every person in these bands you've critiqued has worked their butt off to produce the highest quality show they possibly could, and your comments basically cut half of them off at the knees and let them fall on their faces. And yes, some of your comments can and are being taken as rude and insensitive. Maybe you should take a page out of Sanchez's book and focus your critique on the positive aspects of the performance unless you're commenting on specific musical or visual elements that can be improved (such as intonation, style, or forms). Then you would at least be helpful, unlike the usually acidic comments one would see from newspaper music critics. On a last note, it's obvious that the judges disagree with you on several counts here, as well. Berkner, for instance, ranked 3rd in prelims and 4th in finals. I had an opportunity to hear them in warm up and have to say they sounded flat out amazing while standing still. They more than deserved their spot in the top 3 earlier in the day. Also, Coppell may have a lackluster visual package as usual, but, if I remember correctly, both the music GE judges ranked them in the top four. Obviously the musical portion of the show wasn't boring. Finally, you straight up say that you know Marcus hasn't put the whole show on the field but then say that it's boring and ineffective... Really!? Of course you aren't going to experience the show's intended effect when only half of it is performed. Why be so critical of something that's only partially complete? It just seems negative to me, even if it is "just your opinion". This is just MY opinion, of course, but if you're going to continue to comment on band performances in the future, I think and would personally prefer that you be more supportive and encouraging of the hard work everyone puts into their respective shows.

Then you have the closest official answer you can get without looking at the judging criteria for the GE captions, which your director might have. Essentially, the GE score is about the design of the total package and not necessarily whether it's exciting or not. They're looking for an intended thought, idea, or theme to be communicated through the music and the visual elements, and then they want it to be cohesive and executed well throughout the show. So, basically, there's not a lot you can do about the GE score if the show wasn't designed in that manner. There are some things, like transitional visuals and music, etc., but trust me when I say after 4 years of helping with the Coppell band I know exactly how little those things actually affect the visual GE score.

For an official and somewhat nebulous description of every caption, check out this link. Scroll to the bottom, and the captions will be on the right.

Let's not forget that Wakeland was competing in a class with Richland, Mansfield, and Colleyville, all of whom are stellar 5A programs in their own right.

Hebron was third last year, too--right beyond Marcus and Cedar Park.

I think maybe you mixed up marching and music. Rowlett got a 131 in music and Coppell got 222. That's 5 for Rowlett and 6 for Coppell. Mathematically speaking, Poteet couldn't have had anything above 7 assuming they got 313, so Coppell must have been second. I'm not sure about marching scores, but I wouldn't be surprised if Poteet was higher in this caption.

I wouldn't underestimate Spicer's contribution to the program. 3/4 of the the CP ensemble are still his kids (he ran everything during marching season). Give it 2 or 3 years, and we'll see what Wessels and Chreste do with the band. It may begin to take on a totally different life all it's own.