crunchycookie3

I’m thinking Cy-Ranch really has something special this year. I saw them at Conroe and was blown out of the water (lol) by the commitment to the visual ripples in that show. Super high level of performance happening over there!

Many areas already have their finals draw posted

Does anyone know what the finals draw is? Interested in what that order may potentially look like. I know the performance order really shouldn’t matter, but I think it really does—otherwise, BOA wouldn’t have the top-half/bottom-half draw. Finals will be going very late, and results could potentially come after midnight.

Oops not me accidentally spreading misinformation

I agree- 1-2 seem relatively set. The Champion will be Bridgeland or Cy-Fair, barring some big changes from 7L or Cy-Woods. From Katy results, it seems that Jordan, Tompkins, and JET are in a dead heat for that potential 5th state spot.

Incredible for Rock Hill making top half as such a young program. This has to be relatively new territory for Keller Central as well? Bell with their first class championship in several years...BOA never disappoints!

7:15 p.m. – Class AA: Lovejoy H.S., TX7:30 p.m. – McKinney North H.S., TX7:45 p.m. – Keller H.S., TX8:00 p.m. – Waxahachie H.S., TX8:15 p.m. – Azle H.S., TX8:30 p.m. – Southlake Carroll H.S., TX8:45 p.m. – Forney H.S., TX9:00 p.m. – Rock Hill H.S., TX9:15 p.m. – Timber Creek H.S., TX9:30 p.m. – L.D. Bell H.S., TX9:45 p.m. – Prosper H.S., TX10:00 p.m. – Wakeland H.S., TX10:15 p.m. – Keller Central H.S., TX10:30 p.m. – Class A: Whitesboro H.S., TX

Unfortunately, that’s a classic Cartwright move-recycling shows and concepts for different bands. Glad to hear Prosper is performing it well!

Yes- however, comparing scores cross-contest almost never works. In fact, I don’t think it’s uncommon for groups to get a higher score at Austin prelims than San Antonio prelims, despite having a much more polished product.

I agree- I think the DFW and Houston bands will have Austin area bands like Leander and Westwood on the outside looking in

To say there’s not a financial component to BOA success would be denying the existence of the elephant in the room, but there are so many other factors at play as well- the most important of which is performance quality. Regardless of financial status, ALL of the students last night did a wonderful job! If we’re talking about money, I think it should be to highlight programs that are able to break through the money differential. For example, Bell was the only school in finals with a majority of their students classified as economically disadvantaged, and they placed the highest in the bottom six! Truly a feat for that program. To reduce a program’s performance to money alone is definitely not a fair argument- all students work ridiculously hard to overcome a plethora of obstacles.

On quality of performance alone- I think Cy-Fair will be more than fine to stay in the top half tonight. I had no idea all their woodwind soloists were fluttering around their instruments that much!! Even if their prelims score suffers slightly, they will be on track to at least medal tonight.

I agree! I just caught them in a video and wish I could update my predictions. Like last year, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see a group that made finals at Conroe miss finals here.

This contest is so exciting! Weather is looking a bit dicey this week, setting Saturday up to be the coolest contest of the TX season thus far. I’m particularly interested to see how Coppell and Forney’s tuning fares that early in the morning with temps in the low 50s for the first time this season. I expect the top half of finalist bands to look identical to last year’s. Marcus looks fantastic, Hebron’s music is at an all-time high, Flomo is Flomo, Wakeland looks solid, and Bell has their strongest show in recent memory. I haven’t seen Coppell yet, but I would have a very hard time seeing them outside the top half. Waxahachie is likely knocking on the door of top half, joined by Timber Creek and Forney. Outside of those nine, it’s looking like a mad scramble for 3 finals spots between Lone Star, Aledo, Jenks, SLC, KC, Sachse, and-refreshingly-Trinity! Given the strength of the finalist-caliber bands here, I’m expecting to see recaps as messy as last week’s Conroe prelims.

I have a really difficult time seeing LD Bell outside of the podium. Based on what I've seen, they're having their best show in years! I think they'll be looking at their first TX medal in 10 years here.

I have been checking and still haven't seen the final schedule. Do you know where they posted it?

That’s incredible! 3 brand-new regional champs named in Texas on the same night!

Is this Roma’s first championship win?

I’m not very surprised- Timber Creek has been on the rise! Keller seems to me to be a bit of a lull from the previous years, but we’ll see! They tend to be a late-season peaking band.

Looks like I’ll be dining on my own words for dinner! Having been to all the prelims performances in person, I’m shocked to see how these prelims results shook out. HUGE kudos to Dawson- their piccolo soloist absolutely stole the show.

It was just recently posted on the early season videos thread in the everything music tab

I thought the same thing about Cy-Fair, but after seeing and hearing Wylie East, it may not be the Cy-Fair runaway people are making it out to be

This contest is so difficult to predict! Here’s how I think tiers of the top 20 groups will shake out on Saturday. And with how this season is going, I’m 90% sure there’s a group not listed here that will end up in the top half, if not medalling. Medal Contenders: -Cy-Fair -Cy-Woods -Seven Lakes -Wylie East (wow…. music is likely theirs to lose) -Klein Oak ------------- Solid Locks: -Friendswood -Clear Brook -Klein Cain ------------- Wildcards (as high as top half, could also be out): -Oak Ridge -Dawson -Foster -Jordan ------------- On the edge of finals: -Tompkins -SFA -College Park -Taylor -O’Connor -Tomball Memorial -A&M -Clear Falls

I think Katy and Conroe were just judged quite differently. For example, Clear Brook scored in the top half of finals at Conroe but missed Katy finals. Conversely, SFA missed Conroe finals but made top half of finals at Katy. While this difference was confusing, I think it actually allowed many of the excellent Houston bands with vastly different artistic direction to be showcased. It will be interesting to see if something similar happens this year!

Me too- I guess the regional is *too* good