takigan

lol.....saw that one coming .

I'm pretty sure Marcus is going to pulverize both Poteet and Sherman, and I think our little group of 4A enthusiasts are a little.....well how do I say "delusional" without sounding condescending? Our perennial champion who topped the nation's gold medalist in the previous age is on the move....and now who is left to stand against him?

Having my BOA fan network subscription and all of Mr. Bui's pictures and commentary, it's pretty much the next best thing to actually being there.

I think it would be a safe bet to assume that the entire state of Wyoming doesn't have a single marching band to its name...much less a band that would be interested in going to BOA. So I don't think it's necessarily a lack of existing interest.....I think it's just a lack of existence. Nothing out in the rural west except trailer parks and potatoes dontcha' know.

Also keep in mind "loud" is all relative. It is a fact that at loud rock concerts, the sound techs gradually turn up the volume over the duration of the concert because the current volume wears on your ears and loses its excitement over time. Loud marching bands that are in your face the entire time lose their effect a few minutes in. But be that as it may....sound is relative, a 200 piece band can sound like a 300 piece band if they're really good with dynamic contrast. Loud sounds louder when the soft is softer.....dynamic differences are the key. The audience isn't going to remember the exact level of loudness of that huge band that just got off the field, but they will remember the little band that was playing all petite and quiet like and then all of a sudden started whaling on their faces with power chords. There are plenty of 400 member bands that can play loud, there aren't that many that can play soft. Something to think about....

Limiting marchers on the field wouldn't be a good idea....programs would have to alter their established marching philosophies to accommodate the change. If they limited the number of marchers to say......300, what would programs like Allen do? (Allen High School band has roughly 700 members give or take), what if a band comes from a school that expects every kid in the program to be involved in the marching band, not just alternates that don't do anything. Some programs would have to change up their entire program or risk being shut down by their district.

Too early to know that much....they probably won't post the schedule till after the Area competition....I imagine several bands will drop out of San Antonio if they make it to State.

Yup.....I was a little curious I'll admit. Some of us are nerdy like that. You want to see how curious and nerdy some people can be?....check out some of the stuff people on this site have done: http://www.txbands.com/forums/index.php?ac...=post&id=10 Someone basically took the predictions for BOA San Antonio last year and arranged them into a spreadsheet based on how the Txbands community thought they would place...either someone really knew how to use Excel, or was really bored because that had to have taken FOREVER. I was also trying to find one post by.....I think either Mr. Sanchez or Mr. Bui where they took a U.S. map and put a little BOA icon in every spot on the map where a BOA regional would be held for the upcoming year and posted it on the forum. Pretty nifty little map, that it was.

So for this inventive word; "Maching"....was the word "marching" stuck under your fingers when you typed the word a second time, only that time leaving the letter 'R' out.....or did you mean to hit the 'E' key but your finger slipped and hit the 'G' key instead?

I still think she's saying "so hot" .

Having a short, incomplete show can have adverse effects even if the rules don't specifically call for those adverse effects.

Wow....Marcus destroyed Cedar Park in prelims (4.3 point gap). It was a much closer fight in finals though. I also noticed we haven't had any bands get a division II rating and still make finals in Texas since the La Joya and Houston Regionals in 2005. Legacy, Aledo, Connally and Martin all got div IIs and still made finals this year.

By Illinois you meant Indiana right? Actually the San Antonio Regional is 150 miles closer than the Indianapolis Regional or Grand Nationals. There's a Regional in California this year but it's not a good enough Regional to warrant going cross country for. Loveland actually has a rare history of attending multiple Regionals all over the country including San Antonio in 2003 (AA champions), Grand Nationals in 2004 (semi-finalist: 24th place), San Antonio again in 2006 (again....AA champions), and the Flagstaff Arizona BOA Regional in 2007 (5th place overall). I don't get why they choose to go here when they could just go to Grand Nationals, maybe since the contest is a shorter length of time it's less costly since they don't need to stay in San Antonio as many nights as they would in Indianapolis. Or maybe they know they have a better shot at performing in finals and getting to go up in front of that huge San Antonio crowd when they perform here. I dunno....but it's an awesome deal. EDIT: Oh wow....I was looking at the California Regional and we actually have 2 Texas bands competing in that Regional; Socoro HS and Americas HS. I feel like Xenon or someone mentioned this before but I can't remember which thread it was if he did.

Heh....no they're not attending...but when you add those 3 schools to the list, you've just listed every single band that made finals at a BOA Regional in Texas for the past 2 years.

These bands on your list have never made finals at a BOA Regional for the years you mentioned: Friendswood Keller Lopez Georgetown (in fact, Georgetown's never made it...but then they've only been competing in the circuit since 2005) Also add Spring, Cypress Falls and Pearland to the list...they all made it either in '06 or '07.

And yet again I must say it.....is this not illegal? Since you can't do something like this "live" the sample is prerecorded. Prerecorded human voice and spoken word is illegal, correct?

A sound sample that is played in reverse sounds different than if you were to take a scripted line and speak it backwards (sdrawkcab would sound like dseh-reh-auw-ukkaeb instead of straw-cab). My question is, is this a recording that's played backward and sounds like the former, is it literally being spoken like the former by having listened to a backwards playing recording, or is it literally read as it should be pronounced lingually and sound like the latter?

Hmm....my thoughts on a few of the bands: Cedar Park will most likely win....They proved themselves at Arlington this year that they're riding a good wind this time around. Georgetown will do very well....They beat Cedar Park at this contest last year and was just a hair shy of topping Bowie's score, making them the runner-up. This contest's scoring system has a heavy Music component and this has always been Georgetown's strongest suit. I have them in the top 3. Bowie....I haven't heard much on Bowie this year. They're the reigning champions for this contest and they just recently won the Capital City Festival so they're obviously expected to give a good show. Will they win? Probably not, Cedar Park is amazing....but they also will do very well I imagine, I also have them in the top 3. Connally did very poorly at Westlake last year (I think they barely made finals)....I don't understand why, as they did extremely well in the end-season (4A State finals.....top 3 I think?). They had a good show at Arlington, but I'm curious to see whether their strength lies in design or in the music....if it's the latter then Connally will do very well, if it's the former they could have some trouble. Akins won their class at Cap City just this weekend, and being a former 5A State finalist last time around and scoring in the teens at BOA SA last year....Let's see if that stopping power has carried over into this year.

That....and a show design that caters to both panels.

Ahh, Alice HS.....the old legend. She ain't what she used to be but hopefully she'll give a good show at this contest. Seems like we've got the usual suspects for the most part at this one.

Definitely surprises....the Arlington thread spawned quite a large list of schools that had a shot at those remaining finalist spots, and yet 2 dark horses still snuck in: Mansfield-Legacy and Aledo. And where did Colleyville go? I had them in the top 5 in the pre-competition predictions.

I think the lack of confidence is due to their history of not being a good early season performer. I don't think Hebron even made finals last year at Arlington.....but they still made finals in San Antonio against WAY harder competition. But personally, out of all the bands attending this Regional, the only school I believe has a solid chance of dethroning Marcus is Cedar Park. Now mind you I'm not saying they're a guaranteed runner-up even if they don't do this. Cedar Park just has been a really unstable school the past couple years with the new school openings, rezoning and staff changes and such. It was just a few years ago that many people were expecting Cedar Park to become the next L.D. Bell/Reagan/Churchill/Westfield (a year or 2 before Marcus started owning, and Cedar Park had just won a silver medal in the 5A State Marching Band contest: 2004/2005-ish). Now I hope the 'Park kids don't let this little bit of praise go their heads. I wrote a little schpiel in this post just about my experience with Cedar Park kids and their...."cockiness" in the past, but deleted it figuring it was a little too assuming about CP's program today (which I imagine is a lot better since they haven't won anything major like that in awhile).

I'm keeping up with the feed myself while I'm at work. I'm looking forward to watching all of these performances on Music For All's branch of the DCI Fan Network; The BOA Fan Network. I just bought a $69 1-year subscription a couple days ago so I'll have access to every single performance from all 16 Regionals plus Grand Nationals, as well as free LIVE video streams from San Antonio, St. Louis and Grand Nationals....for this Regional I'm looking forward to seeing Marcus, Cedar Park, Colleyville H, Coppell, Hebron, Berkner...and I'm also looking forward to Legacy, as even though they're not a "superpower" band they still have some of the most interesting show design concepts I've ever seen. Oh yeah, minor correction....On the feed, you mentioned Georgetown's show "Fight or Flight", it's actually "Fighter Flight".....funny thing is, Urkadrums (who's currently in Georgetown's pit) thought that 'Fight or Flight' was actually the show's title until 2 whole weeks in to the school year, and to be honest I personally think it's a better title than the actual title; "Fighter Flight" .

Interesting judging system: Music Execution - 40% Music GE - 20% Visual Execution - 20% Visual GE - 20% Being an early season competition, it seems like a design-oriented show that's in your face with awesome music and high in entertainment value at the expense of looking dirty as sin will actually have an advantage here. Westfield would own this competition.....as well as Richland (granted they were competing against bands of similar strength).

Graham Crackers