I am really looking forward to Friday, when all of the top drum corps come to Houston. Its in a great venue, better than the Alamodome, in my opinion ( too much echo in that dome). I'd look to the Houston show to set the tone for the rest of the season. Anyone else going?

Please share some thoughts on here after the show!

hey just a few thoughts -

IN general what I noticed this year is that there are a lot of good drum lines out there as far as general effect for drums and percussion. In addition, very few corps are emphasizing what I would call " marching and maneuvering." Drills just aren't that challenging as a group.

The only exception is the Cadets - they have a real drill. Its very intense from the get go and their closer is smoking hot with a very quick tempo, precision accuracy, and a lot of "wow" momentum to their show. Their guard scoring is pretty low but I think its because the hornline and drum books are so intense along with the drill that the guard is excellent but may be getting a little lost in all of that overall corps momentum.

I really enjoyed the Santa Clara Vanguard this year too. The Blue Devils are excellent but their drill isn't as challenging as in past years. Some definite "park and blow" moments.

Crossmen were interesting - they rolled out a picture of the sky which was placed outside the field where the pit percussion would usually set up and they marched right off the field onto this skyline quite a bit during the show. They had one of the pit percussion performers singing during the show and I though she was really good.

Overall I do think the Cadets will win this year based on having the show with far and away the most difficulty technically. It's a big gap despite the close scoring.

Thanks for the thoughts!

I know you are a percussion guy - any thoughts on Crown this year? It appears they have improved in this area, but curious as to what you think.

So yes I would say that Crown's field percussion is very improved. They are trying really hard. I think Thom Hannum writes their book ( he wrote the Cadet book when I marched in the 80s). The exposure to error for the field drums is way high this year for Crown. Definetly some intense snare drumming. The technical aspect of the writing isn't quite up with Santa Clara, Cadets, BD, and Bluecoats but the gap is certainly narrowed. It may depend on just the raw talent of the kids who try out for the different drum lines.