takigan

Alex (Clarinot) still shows up in times of trouble . Zach (bluebellbrass) runs Couchmen and a photography business, so he stays pretty busy. mbui is married with kids and works a pretty time-intensive job. Those 2 things often boot out hobbies like this. He was at BOA Conroe last year though, and I wouldn't be surprised if he still lurks. TrumpetMaster blogged the first revived RGV regional in....what year was it? 2014? Not sure what he's been up to lately though. lol, "LMB"....yeah....I used to say whatever was on my mind on the internet back in the 2005-2008 period. That's how the internet is (was?). I'm a quiet guy and am not super sociable in real life, though I realized reaching the end of my Music Ed degree that a lot more people in the band directing world knew who I was by reputation of this site than I might've liked to admit, and as someone who was thinking about becoming a band director at the time, I didn't feel like that was doing any favors for my professional image, lol.

When I was at SHSU we didn't have techs. A few of our upperclassmen were teching at various drum corps...A couple of them are now band directors at some prominent 5A/6A schools. Why do you need to hire techs when you can just use those guys? To put it another way more relevant to the question, a good 6A marching band with 300 kids likely has 5 or 6 juniors/seniors that understand marching band better than any random college kid you hired under no recommendation beyond "she marched drum corps". Those kids should be "teching" the band. 95+% of Japanese schools don't use techs outside of their own student leadership, because their student leadership actually knows what it's doing. Their forms look flawless. In other words, the way I see it, if your student leadership is strong you probably don't need techs, or you need to be much more selective in how you hire techs if you don't want to waste your money.

This is one of the hardest contests to predict in quite a while. You've got an entirely new venue where the majority of attending bands are from a region experiencing an unusual amount of staff movement (Leander ISD, Hendrickson, Round Rock). You've also got this unusually large bubble of bands that are "pretty good". Several of those bands are hard to place because they have had loose cannon competition placements in recent years (Cy Falls, Westwood, Westlake, Berkner, Keller Central, Wakeland). You've also got some newer faces that could potentially do very well (North Shore, Sachse, Cy Woods). This'll be one of the more interesting contests to see how things pan out.

Well, we blocked the entire country of Russia from posting here. So there's that... MTxBGA

Georgetown HS alumni, not Cypress alumni . I live in Cypress and teach private lessons at 3 schools in Cy-Fair ISD.

That first week of freshman year is one of my most treasured and vivid memories of being in band. I remember the first full band rehearsal at the end of the first day performing 'Tempered Steel' for the first time as a full group and just being blown away at how deafeningly LOUD the drumline was up close! Both the drumline and french horn sections were stellar, and with all the blaring horn parts and the slamming, slicing and splashing percussion book that piece had, it literally felt like being in an action movie. It was really incredible...

I have many, many powers. Rest assured they shall never be used for evil....also rest assured they are pretty much useless outside of a Texas marching band forum.

Moved to "Everything Music"....again (and merged with original thread)

I think if you swapped out Kingfishers for Wine Dark Sea, you'd have a pretty good nautical theme going (I was thinking like "Hydroelectric" or "The Sea's Strength"). Lightning Field would probably align with Hydroelectric as well.

I spent the last 5 years from 2012-2017 reading your posts wondering who the heck you were. It was like "This guy really knows his stuff, I wonder who he is". It was kind of an "ah ha!" moment when I found out because I did know who you were all that time [by reputation], I just didn't have any way of attaching the name "principalagent' to a face

Only the top 5. I think that's where they pulled the results from that were quoted on the old SMBC official archive on the UIL website before they took it down.

Yup, no one in 2000. From '85-2001 we never saw more than 2 TX bands attend in a given year, and there were several years when no one went. 2002 was the breakout year when SIX bands went which began a trend that has continued to this day. In '99, only Leander and Churchill went. In '98 only The Woodlands and Churchill. '97 - Richland (14th in semis) '96 - No one '95 - Westfield (1st in prelims, 2nd in finals) '94 - Klein (7th in finals) '93 - Duncanville (9th) and of course, Spring. '92 - No one '91 - Duncanville (6th), Spring (8th) '90 - Westfield (2nd in finals) '89 - No one '88 - No one '87 - No one '86 - No one '85 - Westfield

Georgetown won 4A in '80, '81 and '82 as well, but I don't know if you would count the pilot years before '83. If we did, that would also mean they also hold the record streak at 6 ('80, '81, '82, '83, '84, '85). '82 5A - Odessa Permian 4A - Georgetown 3A - Medina Valley 2A - Clint 1A - LBJ '81 5A - Crockett 4A - Georgetown 3A - Waco Robinson 2A - Southlake Carroll 1A - Iraan '80 5A - Crockett 4A - Georgetown 3A - Medina Valley 2A - Howe 1A - Iraan (this would bump their total to 6 as well) '79 4A - Round Rock 3A - Fredricksburg 2A - Medina Valley 1A - Southlake Carroll Dug these out of the Leaguer archive. I love reading the band articles. Apparently people used to bet on marching contests way back in the day like they would at a horse track.

Moved to "Everything Music"

youtube.com/watch?v=Ywf7bI86t4M

Which organizations? An important detail. If your answer is something like "Reagan HS and SFA University" you're not making a fair comparison.

Waco ISD has hosted Area contests in the past. Wouldn't surprise me if that's the stadium of choice to be honest.

Full enclosure with no roof to trap the reverberation...Sounds like the perfect acoustic environment.

You can draw a more fair comparison by looking at it this way: Take the Greater Tulsa, OK area which has 1.2 million people within 6,000 square miles and cross-reference it with Travis county, which also has 1.2 million people, though within a denser 1,000 square miles. Take a tally of the top 10 schools that fall within the reach of Greater Tulsa, then take the top 10 schools in the Austin area, but again only the ones that reside within Travis county, since the entire Greater Austin metro has closer to 2 million people, which makes the comparison unfair. It's a pretty interesting comparison since several of the Travis County bands competed against Tulsa bands on the national stage this year. Here's who you get: Tulsa: 1. Broken Arrow (HR #4) 2. Union (HR #19) 3. Owasso (HR #Next10) 4. Jenks (Beat Anderson @ BOA STL. Made Finals.) 5. Bixby (Beat Anderson @ BOA STL. Made Finals.) 6. Coweta (Beat Collinsville @ OBA State Finals 7. Collinsville (Lost to Coweta @ OBA State Finals. Placed 29th @ STL, lost to Anderson) 8. Skiatook 9. Berryhill 10. Bartlesville (Placed 50th @ STL) Travis/Austin: 1. Vandegrift (HR #6) 2. Hendrickson ( HR #15) 3. James Bowie (HR #20) 4. Westwood (Beat Owasso in STL Prelims, lost to Owasso in Finals, but beat Bixby and Jenks) 5. Westlake (#prev ranked, Placed 31st @ SA) 6. Pflugerville (32nd @ SA) 7. Anderson (26th @ STL, lost to Bixby and Jenks) 8. Lake Travis (42nd @ SA) 9. McCallum (22nd @ 5A State) 10. Austin (27th @ 5A State) Conclusion: It's still not an entirely fair comparison since even though we've taken a major city like Tulsa, it's still nowhere near as densely populated as Austin. The tax-base of Austin is also greater (more money floating around and more of it going to band programs). Comparing just the Top 5, the 2 areas are pretty comparable, but Oklahoma's skill level drops pretty quick in the 2nd half. I should say I did a similar comparison on the MFA forums several years back between Greater Austin (including Leander/Round Rock etc.) and Greater Indianapolis, whose populations are both in the 2 million range. Similar top-heavy stats for Indy, though Texas still ran deeper. Though, again, that was 5 or 6 years ago. With how good the Round Rock and Leander schools have gotten nowadays, I'd say Austin would win out entirely.

You get 10 hours of free time to spend on marching fundamentals at any point in the summer before August 1st.

It can work...especially if you're prepared for it well in advance. Basically it means scaling back the drill, the visual layers, ditching your pre-show, and starting your competition season later with a quicker planned peak. Additional solutions include learning stand-tunes during May camp, expanding May freshman camp by a couple days and getting as much music out of the mix as possible so that one week can be spent focusing completely 100% on learning the show.

It's the most viewed thread in the history of the site. It's also the most replied competition thread, while being #4 most replied out of all threads .

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Np. Yeah. I was comparing a recording of Elsa's Procession that the Lopez HS Honor Band did at TMEA this year with a version done by I think it was Inagakuen. Ina played with a slightly darker ensemble sound and with a richer tonal blend, but Lopez had more depth of expression....partly because the arrangement was different and allowed for that greater expression, but still. While a Japanese MS band plays more expressively than a Texas MS band, a Japanese HS band often doesn't have the level of musicality to match their technical perfection, so the really good Texas kids catch up to them and even pass them up in HS. However, no American band can play Shostakovich (Festive Overture etc.) or a Circus March better than the Japanese. They're unstoppable when it comes to playing very fast very perfectly and with explosive energy. Pull it down to

So, UIL and BOA (the 2 main circuits highlighted by this site and the ones that the majority of our membership follows) are over and done with great success. Some states still have their local state circuits to finish (I believe Florida's and California's were this weekend, as were a few others) and I'm sure there are various members with interest in those contests as well that are eagerly awaiting their taking place. But meanwhile, in Japan....they've just had their own national event for HS marching bands, whose award ceremony took place roughly 24 hours ago as of posting this. 25 of some the world's most skilled marching bands took the floor at the 16,000 seat Osaka-Jo arena. Their drill is bare-bones, oftentimes symmetrical with minimal frills and minimal pit percussion, and in many ways is reminiscient of corps style bands in the 70's and 80's. However, their sound is HUGE, and bears a timbre and sonority that's reminscient of finalist-tier DCI corps but with the intonation and balance of a university wind orchestra. What they do is old-fashioned and might even be considered "boring" by some....but by measure of what is being achieved, the best bands are unparalleled by any HS band on this side of the Pacific. The contest format is based off of 1980's era UIL (Or to put it another way, the contest was invented in the 1980s based on the most developed and superior scholastic marching contest format in the world at the time--UIL, and has evolved little since then--because it's Japan). You have 47 prefectures (or districts). Each hosts their own contest and qualifies 2 bands to the regional contest (occasionally 3). Bands have a performance timeslot of 7 minutes (6 of which is performance) and performs once (no finals). The contest is judged by 3 judges, who are not usually teachers but rather professional wind musicians from various professional orchestras and wind ensembles (The Kyoto prefecture competition had a retired Trumpet player from the Kansai Philharmonic judging, a Bassoonist with the Kyoto Philharmonic and a freelance Percussionist who is a Tama performing artist). There are no placements. Scoring uses a box format and resultant ratings adhere to a strictly followed 3:4:3 division system. So in other words, 30% of the performing bands will receive a first division (called Gold), 40% are given a second division (called Silver), and 30% are given a 3rd division (called Bronze). The 2 (or 3) advancing bands are taken from the highest scoring Gold recipients. A non-advancing Gold-recipient is sometimes said to have received だめ金 [dame kin] or "Dud Gold". So it's very similar to UIL Region, except instead of the everybody-gets-a-trophy mentality that ends up saddling 75% of the bands with a first division, you end up with a grueling contest that's difficult to advance from....sort of like UIL Area. The 47 prefectures feed 11 Regions (Tokai, East & West Kanto, Tokyo, Kansai, Kyushu, Hokuriku, Tohoku, Chugoku, Hokkaido and Shikoku). The process at this competition is essentially the same. Still 3 judges. The number of advancing bands can be as few as 1, and as many as 4 depending on the number of competing bands. Then at nationals you have 25ish bands judged by 7 judges (a Trumpet, Horn, Trombone, Flute, Clarinet, Sax and Percussion pro. I couldn't tell you for sure if they judge instrumental captions or not). This year 8 bands received the coveted Gold at Nationals, making them the best of the best. They are as follows: Yodagawa Technical High School - All-Boys school from Osaka in the Kansai region. Takigawa 2nd High School - Also from Kansai. Kansai sent 3 bands to Nats. Two of them got Gold, the other got Silver. Kyoto Tachibana (who's performing in the Tournament of Roses Parade this year and consistent National God recipient) is also from Kansai and unfortunately got dud-gold at Regionals this year. Very tough Region to get out of. Tachikawa High School - From Kashiwa City in the East Kanto region of Greater Tokyo, Chiba prefecture. Their Wind Orchestra won Nat'l Gold this year as well on stage. Anjo Gakuen - From the Tokai region in the Aichi prefecture. Link provided is to band Youtube page, but you can watch their 2016 show here. Seika Girls High School - From the Kyushu region in Fukuoka City waaaay on the western edge of Japan. They've gotten Gold at Nationals more times than any other band and received Straight As (essentially Box 5) from all 7 judges this year. Their wind orchestra performed at Midwest in 2010 and won Gold this year at All-Japan Nats as well. Tamana Girls HS - Also from Kyushu. They performed at a college in Washington State a few years back. Inagakuen Sogo HS - From Saitama City, a northern suburb of Tokyo in East Kanto. Their wind orchestra has also won gold at nats numerous times including this year. They did a concert tour in Florida in 2006 that ended at the FMEA convention. - Also from East Kanto. Video is from a week ago with a lower quality mic. Most linked videos are from 2016 Nats with a few exceptions. It's very difficult yet to find 2017 videos, even from the prefecture and regional competitions. Fancam recordings from the venues are rarely shared, and the rights to the video are owned by Fuji TV and nationally televised at a later date. I consider often how far a Grand National medalist or BOA San Antonio champion from the last few years would do in a circuit like this, either choosing to march their usual concepts or if they were to go for a more "precision" approach like these Japanese groups. In most cases I feel X band has the clarity but lacks the dynamics, while Y band has the dynamics but lacks the clarity. I don't think the marching is up to that level at all though.