ChristopherRoden

You’re so right! That’s on me (second time I’ve made this mistake… )

1:27:30 Not a Texas group but will be competing with some in a few weeks

I think it’ll be super super close between Hendrickson, forney and Cy woods for the last two spots

This is probably the best way to look at this discussion. As a visual instructor and now drill writer my personal experiences within the marching world have undoubtedly shaped my subconscious opinions of what I value in a visual design.

1. I’m saying that just about all of the top tier Texas groups have comparable visual programs. 2. I simply disagree. And that’s okay! This is a subjective activity and neither of us are judges (as far as I know) so we can both take what we said for what they are: opinions.

I really don’t think their visual programs are any more complex than any of the top 20 Texas visual programs, sorry. edit: Last year and the year before, yes. Avon especially had a stunning visual program compared to top Texas groups. This year, after watching their show, and most of the highest tier Texas bands, I could not find one visual moment that a Texas band isn’t doing something similar to at the exact same level. Even the amount of difficult visual moments is very comparable. Carmel is the same story but the past few years have really not been anything special visually.

blue springs video …

Castle: WOW I was not expecting that!! Super exciting show and performed at a much higher level than recent years. I think it’s the buy in. The individuals seem to like this show a lot. Avon: Alright, yeah.. my qualm is that the box props are the only indication (with maybe flag colors) of any sort of “Mondriesque”. A bit disappointing visually compared to last year so far, but it’s very early yet. Carmel: what. This looks like a different echelon of band entirely than they’re used to competing in. The pacing is really uninspiring and for a show about arcs there are an awful lot of blocks and VERY few arc sets… they sound fine but nothing to write home about.

These are just my observations after seeing each of their shows

Finalists: 1. Pearland 2. Dawson 3. Dickinson 4. Foster 5. Clements ------------------------ 6. Clear Brook 7. Brazoswood 8. SFA 9. Fulshear 10. Pasadena Memorial ------------------------- 11. Clear Falls 12. Clear Lake

I did, step up from last year in all ways: design, marching/visual, and music. Will be fun to watch them this season, too bad they pulled out of BOA webster

TWHS Cy Fair Dawson H.S., TX Foster H.S., TX Jordan H.S., TX Klein Oak H.S., TX Wylie East H.S., TX College Park H.S., TX North Shore Senior H.S., TX Obra D. Tompkins H.S., TX Friendswood H.S., TX Oak Ridge H.S., TX -------------------- Clear Brook H.S., TX Tomball Memorial H.S., TX Stephen F. Austin H.S., TX As a fun thought experiment on the volatility of Houston bands, I removed TWHS and Cy fair from the above list and randomized the bands under them and came up with these rankings. Seeing how different these bands are every year, I think this absolutely COULD be the case come Sept 28th.

Klein Oak H.S., TX Clear Brook H.S., TX North Shore Senior H.S., TX Obra D. Tompkins H.S., TX The Woodlands H.S., TX Dawson H.S., TX Jordan H.S., TX Tomball Memorial H.S., TX Friendswood H.S., TX Wylie East H.S., TX Oak Ridge H.S., TX Foster H.S., TX College Park H.S., TX Stephen F. Austin H.S., TX Cy-Fair H.S., TX At least 3 of these groups will not make finals... exciting competition!

If we apply shifts from 21 going into 22 to 23-24 we get the following order: 1. JET 2. Tompkins 3. Bridgeland 4. Cy Fair 5. Jordan 6. Katy 7. 7L 8. Cy Woods 9. Cy Ranch 10. ??? Similarly applying shifts from 22 going into 21 to 23-24 we get the following order: 1. Tompkins 2. Bridgeland 3. Katy 4. Cy Woods 5. Cy Fair 6. Cy Ranch 7. 7L 8. Cinco Ranch 9. Jordan 10. ??? Bands shift an average of 2.5 places per year in this area, which seems rather high!

It looks like it’s all actually based on prelims results?

Exactly! It’s always super cool to see how things shift in just one week

for reference, my list from last fall: 1 Wylie East 2 Cy fair 3 Seven lakes 4 Clear Brook 5 College Park 6 Austin 7 Foster 8 Dawson 9 Oak Ridge 10 Jordan 11 Friendswood 12 Tomball Memorial —————————— Klein Oak Tompkins Cy Woods O connor Fulshear College station Klein Cain Cy falls Cy Ranch A&M consolidated Clear falls JET Magnolia Porter

As someone who watched all of prelims and ranked the bands I agree. My order didn’t match the results at all! I think I only had half of the finalists correct, and none of the placements/captions. Houston bands tend to be so volatile and close like that. A band who made top half at Shenandoah could be 10+ places out of finals the next year, and then be top half at the other Houston BOA (SFA ‘22 comes to mind). This also happens vice versa all the time which makes Houston bands soooo interesting to keep up with. It often comes down to the little things like design, ratio of freshmen to seniors etc. Looking forward to this fall

I’d want to hear some more show reveals before I make any more predictions lol

Cy Woods has this on their calendar...

Fun stuff! decided to partake: LD Bell (vis/GE tie) Forney (GE tie) Keller (music) Southlake Carroll Dripping springs Waxahachie Cy Woods Aledo Lake Travis Friendswood 7L Winston Churchill

7L show “for whom the bell tolls” could be the same vibe as their 2021 show I think. We will see how that fares!

Wow if I was Prosper on a grand nats year… I’d opt out of UIL for a year if that’s still a possibility…

5A Alignment looks a bit like a hot mess... Waxahachie is now in area J instead of Area B. Area B looks a lot smaller, we'll have to see how the numbers pan out. Waxahachie also likely won't stay at their current size for much longer so that will be interesting to see. Only area's B and C were altered it looks like, unless the regions were redrawn which I doubt.

Football is out, when will we hear about marching band?