TrenBS

Dont get me wrong, I loved the aesthetic a lot, but volume wasn’t particularly amazing and feet had a lot of errors, but even then thats holding them to a high standard, this competition is super difficult so were really looking at individuals and diagonals over just simply the forms, and if they went to most areas/state they would be a lock for finals/top half

This is my current ranking, Mustang had a ton of foot errors from my POV which is why I have them lower, Im also not a judge so they could have bonkers GE haha

I think for UIL theres an argument for 3rd personally, the writing for them this year is very very strong, which usually is what held them back in previous years in my opinion

Honestly, dont change predictions on what other people say would be my advice, even if they end up being horribly wrong its your opinion, and making mistakes will let you become better next time, and who knows you may end up being right and making THEM look stupid🤷‍♂️ The thing with HS marching people tend to mess up which is a bi-product of how DCI functions is that nobody is entitled to positions, obviously legacy bands are going to be more likely to place high because they usually do, due to their staff and funding at the time being strong, but with Keller and CTJ you can see them placing low compared to how they usually place this year. We can probably expect this to keep happening with retirement of great staff and the development of new powerhouses (Pearland and Bridgeland Id say are the newest “powerhouses” given how recently successful they've been), so honestly do your opinions regardless of what others say, predictions are supposed to be fun and if theres only one “right” answer before a competition even begins, thats being tone deaf to the nature of HS marching

He meant blind as in not knowing which band is performing, not in the literal sense, although the wording is pretty funny lol

I agree, although I dont really think it will be much of an indicator unless a generally successful BOA band does very poor or a generally successful UIL band does REALLY well, or if one of them places really really bad, the scoring is just so different that its more of a foundation to start making proper guesses

Yeah thats how it is (6A should be 4 for every spot with how overly competitive 6A is but ssshhhhhh)

This is becoming a long response so Ill preface that I'm not yelling at you in particular, but I've also thought about comparing Grand Nationals to San Antonio, so this is more my thoughts on the matter lol Is Grand Nationals tougher in regards to finalists? Sure, definitely with Carmel Avon and Blue Springs the top half is extremely hard to break, but for the bottom half of finalists there's a strong argument that BOA San Antonio is more difficult, since Southlake, Prosper, and Hendrickson all made finals at BOA GN in 2022, and I couldn't even tell you the last time these bands either made BOA SA finals (or even beaten Wakeland at a BOA competition which typically places on the very low end of BOA SA finals, in which Southlake placed low in BOA Prosper finals and Hendrickson missed at a regional, albeit a very difficult one) From there it drops off even further, I know it's not really fair to compare scores between competitions, but the top 32 at San Antonio is breaking 80s and sometimes doesn't even fall below 82, while at GN it's fairly common to have multiple mid-high 70s scores which on the sheets is almost a whole area below an 80s score (80s being all "usually"s on the middle end, with 70s having low "usually"s, or high "sometime''s scores) and ignoring that, TX bands who are middle contenders at BOA San Antonio typically make finals at GN, or at the very least place very high in Semi-Finals Obviously, there can't be an objectively "right" opinion unless we held these contests at the same day, had the same judges score on the same standards, and placed people both in BOA SA and Grand Nationals, but saying that GN is absolutely way more competitive than BOA SA is being pretty reductive to the absolute depth of BOA SA, and at worst is a pretty slim margin to be judging both contests competitively, but I absolutely agree that top half of finals at Grand Nationals is way more competitive, particularly with Avon, Carmel, Broken Arrow, Blue Springs, and William Mason in particular, but top to bottom Id argue that BOA SA has more depth in competition

If possible, could someone post McKinney bands somewhere after they finish? Partly for me but also since most of them dont have recordings since their Band night almost 3 weeks ago lol

The area itinerary will be released after the region contests are finished as any bands receiving a second division will not participate in area prelims (99% certain not a single band here will get a 2, I promise you lol), so making a schedule now would be redundant, although the draw order is what the full schedule would look like, so you can kinda guess about when each performance will happen through there Also, go Broncos lmao

The top middle seats (up the stairs) are the seats with backs, the rest spanning out Im fairly sure are normal bleachers along with the bottom seats, so essentially second floor middle should be the seat seats

Can confirm McKinney is essentially a humidity trap right now, so hydrating is definitely going to be necessary haha

Boyd has full band retreat on their schedule for area, so its most likely the case since the main contenders from area C (and coordinators outside of the Mesquite folks) are here, and so I dont doubt that Area C and J would do full band retreat given how the groups here are much more “modern” in terms of the ways of thinking Also heres my October prediction, Id normally wait a lot longer but many groups have put a ton of show on the field recently and Im starting to create some solid (about as solid as you can get for pre-area) takes that differs my opinion greatly nowadays: 1. Flower Mound 2. Marcus 3. Hebron 4. Boyd/Prosper [TIE] 5. Boyd/Prosper [TIE] 6. McKinney High 7. Wylie 8. Rock Hill 9. Wylie East 10. Little Elm 11-15: Plano East, Lewisville, Plano West, Allen, Plano Sr. Im confident in Little Elms ability to make area finals, visually they look cleaner than the groups below them, and music is starting to click in, now I dont think theyd beat Wylie East, Rock Hill, Wylie, or High in BOA reasonably, but I could see them stealing some 7-8 captions and potentially sneaking up to 9th, and WEast just has plenty of dirt that we will need to see them clean before judging completely, they could be 5th, and they could also be 9th currently

I could see that logic applying this year, but to be completely honest, were still really early given how 6A area is in November, so many groups are extending their timelines which are resulting in weaker scores in the early season (Wylie East is an example, placing 16th at Conroe after placing like 5th last year, and they just started closer work), so until BOA Prosper and after, area predictions are gonna be near impossible to be accurate, and with KCent placing 11th at HEB, we could argue that Haltom could make it over TC and KCent if we went based off of HEB🤷‍♂️

Ive been loving the representation of other states in these competitive competitions in Texas (BOA Prosper as another example), it makes me wish in a vacuum that Texas was a little smaller or that transportation technology and expense was better, but Texas must be big to fit as many HEBs and Buccees we can lol

COVID literally killed the band, at least for a while, they did move themselves further away from last place last year but they still need to find their foundation and keep improving in order to reach where they used to be in 2018, I feel for those directors that watched the band crash because of something completely out of their control, because a simple director change doesnt make you go from the size of McKinney Boyd/Sachse along with being a state qualifier to barely having a percussion section and being near last in the area in a year

I really like the lineup that MMI has this year, none of the schools really feel far ahead of the others, and there's a large amount of participation compared to the local competitions also occuring this day, hopefully this competition could get moved off from the BOA Bedford weekend we could see this contest grow as a sort of "pre-UIL" style of judging and competition, since the sheet is much closer to how UIL judges compared to BOA

When you type these responses out and being blatantly rude and disrespectful to people on these forums trying to help, understand that you represent the Cedar Park band with your presence online, and especially in these band forums, and you should not post anything you wouldn't want the directors or the district to see, since you hurt the perspective people have with yalls program with responses like this.

I will say prop wise its purely budgetary, McKinney North is generally less well off than Boyd and even High, and that prop was one they made in 2022 that they are kinda forced to use until they can have enough people to properly fund for more, so unless they still ONLY have that prop by 2026, they should definitely be cut some slack on the prop scene Music wise they do need some variation, the intro kinda feels like a mashup between the last 2 jazz shows in a way, and the ballad feels like 2023 2.0, which isn’t inherently bad, but as a viewer Id like to see more distinction between the shows musically since this year is gonna cause some identity fazing between the past few years Although Im extremely happy aboutt their recruitment, they are a much bigger size WITH an alternate block, which they havent had in a long time

If its not on youtube it was likely a leak, which for LISD is gonna be hard to come by unless you know people lol

Yes, unless I think 2 bands get a second division, which realistically only the newly 6A groups (Princeton, and the new Denton school) are in danger of receiving, but I find that scenario very unlikely 4 bands to state is the current situation, unfortunately

Bad news: my videos just refuse to send to my google photos and both of them are multiple gigabytes, so I cant reasonably send them Good news: the guy next to me had a MUCH better setup and posted them on youtube, so all the McKinney bands up to the 4-5 minute mark are now posted lol https://youtu.be/NuJUXxdhkQA?feature=shared

I saw Emerson from a few days ago, legitimately didnt notice the colors and thought I was watching LT, lol. They have a very strong chance at area I feel like personally

Just saw McKinney North, if anyone would like the recording dm me, I honestly really like the show since it feels like a natural evolution from the past 2 years, here's my prediction having heard a decent chunk of the area: 1. Wakeland (sweep) 2. Lone Star 3. McKinney North 4. Lebanon Trail/Emerson 5. Emerson/Lebanon Trail 6. Argyle 7. The Colony 8. Walnut Grove 9. Centennial 10. Anna

Id like to see it if that is all good