5A band size

[treyj]

How many winds does your band march?

 

What about overall performers?

 

 

And I'm wondering if you think smaller 5A bands are at a disadvantage with large bands in the sense of UIL competitions.

 

 

 

We march 80 winds ( majority woodwinds) and have around 120 overall performers (pit, drumline, colorguard, drummajors)

 

 

I'm not complaining about being small or anything.

 

I enjoy it, i just wanted to get peoples input :]

 

 

thanks!

[CaviBoy09]

I'm from Spring band and we small campared to those titan bands like L.D. Bell, Marcus, or Winston Churchill, and i feel being smaller than them is a deffinate disadvantage. When you have big bands like them your band gets more money, more people to use and so fourth. There should be a limit on how many people u can have marching on the field. I mean they have a limit on the length of the show, why not the number of marchers in a band. of course this is my opinion and many others my thinhk different. But that is my view on that topic.

[takigan]

Limiting marchers on the field wouldn't be a good idea....programs would have to alter their established marching philosophies to accommodate the change. If they limited the number of marchers to say......300, what would programs like Allen do? (Allen High School band has roughly 700 members give or take), what if a band comes from a school that expects every kid in the program to be involved in the marching band, not just alternates that don't do anything. Some programs would have to change up their entire program or risk being shut down by their district.

[Donezo]

Speaking of Allen, I've always thought they'd be unbeatable if they had a "varsity" marching band with only the top three concert bands or so. This would allow them to march more competitive music and drill. They do well enough as it is essentially competing a college band half-time show, but that program has potential to be so much more. I competed in the same region as those kids and I know they have a phenomenal talent pool. However, the school district would probably revolt if they ever changed.

[AverageMarcher]

I personally don't think that smaller bands are at a disadvantage.

Sure, we may not be able to take up the entire field, but overall i think

the average marcher (no pun intended) of a small band is more skilled than

an average marcher of a large band. Not always true, but i am basing my reasoning

off the assumption that smaller bands = easier to pinpoint weaklings and clean drill.

though, it would be freakin awesome if we had a color guard that could fill the entire field

on their own =/

Then again, i wish we had enough people to go

"Hey, you're not all that good at marching your drill. Lets go ahead and switch you out with

an alternate."

[treyj]

  Donezo said:

Speaking of Allen, I've always thought they'd be unbeatable if they had a "varsity" marching band with only the top three concert bands or so. This would allow them to march more competitive music and drill. They do well enough as it is essentially competing a college band half-time show, but that program has potential to be so much more. I competed in the same region as those kids and I know they have a phenomenal talent pool. However, the school district would probably revolt if they ever changed.

 

 

speaking of allen again

 

our predraw at area b marching contest is right after them.

AH it's going to make us look SO small!

its like 400 people

then 80 people.

 

 

:/

 

lol

[treyj]

  AverageMarcher said:

I personally don't think that smaller bands are at a disadvantage.

Sure, we may not be able to take up the entire field, but overall i think

the average marcher (no pun intended) of a small band is more skilled than

an average marcher of a large band. Not always true, but i am basing my reasoning

off the assumption that smaller bands = easier to pinpoint weaklings and clean drill.

though, it would be freakin awesome if we had a color guard that could fill the entire field

on their own =/

Then again, i wish we had enough people to go

"Hey, you're not all that good at marching your drill. Lets go ahead and switch you out with

an alternate."

 

 

yeah i agree with that. cleaning is way easier.

 

I'm talking more sound though. It is really hard to compete with a banda of 200 + when you marching less than 100, you know?

 

not to say it can't be done.

 

and i know it isn't all about volume.

 

A smaller cleaner, more musical band should win.

 

i just don't think that is always the case

[itsstephenyo]

All you have to do to prove that band size is often obsolete is look at Grand Nationals every year. Tarpon Springs has maybe 80 marchers total and are a consistent GN Finalist. LD Bell on the other hand, probably doubles or close to triples their numbers and are also a consistent GN Finalist.

 

Band size doesn't affect it as much as you think so. Case in point: GN Finals 1993. Duncanville places 9th behind Jackson Academy. Jackson Academy is a TINY band. I think they had MAYBE 40 kids on the field. You can even see the video here.

http://www.jacksonacademy.org/NetCommunity...6&srcid=915

[borchnork]

I will hafta agree with a lot of these points here, especially cus I have now seen both sides coming from Centennial where I think last year we marched 74 winds? to this year at UNT where we are marching over 80 flutes and clarinets alone (I think grand total we have about 300 on the field).

 

Sound is an amazing thing to have. One of the hugggeee disadvantages to a smaller band is that everybody has to play all the time to even try to compete with a larger groups sound.

 

But at the other end, the larger numbers have made a huge difference in the cleanliness in drill. Sure, UNT's band is naturally gifted in the playing and marching department, and we don't need a super large amount of drilling to perfect our show cus of the experience we have, but trying to get a section of 45 kids to stay in a straight line is nowhere near as simple as back at CHS when we had 20 flutes.

 

 

Personally, I hafta say smaller is better. But I say smaller very... loosely. I think about 140-180 winds is more than enough to get a full, powerful sound if everybody plays their instrument correctly, and a small enough ensemble to make drill cleaning and fundamental improvement very simple.

[itsstephenyo]

I always thought that marching about 160-190 total was a great size for a band for exactly the reasons you said. Big enough for a big sound and small enough to get really clean.

[takigan]

Also keep in mind "loud" is all relative.

 

It is a fact that at loud rock concerts, the sound techs gradually turn up the volume over the duration of the concert because the current volume wears on your ears and loses its excitement over time. Loud marching bands that are in your face the entire time lose their effect a few minutes in.

 

But be that as it may....sound is relative, a 200 piece band can sound like a 300 piece band if they're really good with dynamic contrast. Loud sounds louder when the soft is softer.....dynamic differences are the key. The audience isn't going to remember the exact level of loudness of that huge band that just got off the field, but they will remember the little band that was playing all petite and quiet like and then all of a sudden started whaling on their faces with power chords. There are plenty of 400 member bands that can play loud, there aren't that many that can play soft.

 

Something to think about....

[rpd]

Were 91 winds, 14 drum line, 6 pit, and I want to say 12 color guard. And were actually one of the bigger bands in my district. Although, more notably, we have a senior class of 19 people. And the Junior class is just as big. Almost 75% of our band is underclassmen.

[JustAddWat3r]

speaking of small bands...

 

wow

 

http://www.jacksonacademy.org/NetCommunity...6&srcid=874

[itsstephenyo]

You just reposted the exact link I posted three spots above you.

[JustAddWat3r]

OH! wow...ok my bad. yea my friend just showed it to me and i didnt know where he got it from. so i just decided to share it on here...guess this is wehre he got it from...

[itsstephenyo]

haha, it's all good. Jackson Academy is probably the pinnacle of a tiny band beating out big bands. 1993 GN was special because of Spring 93's incredible groundbreaking show and Jackson Academy laying a hurt on a bunch of big bands, most notably Duncanville.

[Fata1]

Our band marches something like 81 winds, 14 drumline, 12 pit, and 10 colorguard. We also have a JV section that marches simple drill in the back at football games and certain contests if they're doing good and they have about 12 students. Overall, we march somewhere around 117 without JV and 129 with JV.

 

I don't mind our size too much. I wish we could have about 20 more on varsity. The only bad thing is that because of our overall size, we're forced to march a lot of kids that would probably make JV in a larger band. Our talent pool isn't as large as many large bands.

 

In the end, a large band doesn't necessarily beat a small band. It's just that a large band has a larger talent pool.

 

On a side note, thanks for posting the link to Jackson Academy. I've always wanted to see their 1993 show. I've heard a lot about it from numerous people. It definitely lives up to its fame. That trombone solo is awesome.

Edited October 9, 2008 by Fata1

[treyj]

  itsstephenyo said:

I always thought that marching about 160-190 total was a great size for a band for exactly the reasons you said. Big enough for a big sound and small enough to get really clean.

 

 

haha

 

that size sounds nice!

 

 

i wish...

 

 

nah

 

small is good too :]

[borchnork]

  takigan said:

Also keep in mind "loud" is all relative.

 

It is a fact that at loud rock concerts, the sound techs gradually turn up the volume over the duration of the concert because the current volume wears on your ears and loses its excitement over time. Loud marching bands that are in your face the entire time lose their effect a few minutes in.

 

But be that as it may....sound is relative, a 200 piece band can sound like a 300 piece band if they're really good with dynamic contrast. Loud sounds louder when the soft is softer.....dynamic differences are the key. The audience isn't going to remember the exact level of loudness of that huge band that just got off the field, but they will remember the little band that was playing all petite and quiet like and then all of a sudden started whaling on their faces with power chords. There are plenty of 400 member bands that can play loud, there aren't that many that can play soft.

 

Something to think about....

 

 

I think it'd actually be easier to get a larger band to play soft.... just point to half the band during a soft section and say "Don't Play."

 

That does sound a tad arrogant, but I think that option would be easier to make dynamic contrasts in a larger ensemble than trying to get a smaller group to play louder.

[itsstephenyo]

But in a situation like BOA with field judges and individual music performance scores, that could seriously hurt the band if only half of them play. I'm sure the judge walking around would ask questions as to why every other trumpet is playing.

[Steeldrum]

How many march in the Cedar Park band? They didn't look that large at BOA Arlington but sounded much louder than Marcus and Coppell who are obviously much larger.

[treyj]

  borchnork said:

I think it'd actually be easier to get a larger band to play soft.... just point to half the band during a soft section and say "Don't Play."

 

That does sound a tad arrogant, but I think that option would be easier to make dynamic contrasts in a larger ensemble than trying to get a smaller group to play louder.

 

 

Yeah I agree 100%

 

In a small band every person counts for so much more than in a huge band. If one person is wrong or whatever it is magnified X10.

[aaron067]

  Steeldrum said:

How many march in the Cedar Park band? They didn't look that large at BOA Arlington but sounded much louder than Marcus and Coppell who are obviously much larger.

 

 

Cedar Park is marching 144 wind players, while Coppell generally marches anywhere from 160-180. Bear in mind that balance and intonation play a HUGE part in how well a band can project. Coppell doesn't focus on matching so much, Marcus focuses on a more symphonic sound, and Cedar Park takes the aggressive concert band approach. Coppell will no doubt be able to match Cedar Park's volume by State, but they'll be hard pressed to sound as good doing it.

[borchnork]

well, yah, I do get the point about the on-field judges thing. But then again, the judges don't necessarily have a score do they? And even if they did, I'm sure a director would arrange the pieces to where it was accepted that it was a "chamber music" section.

[lhstrumpet]

49 Brass

70ish Woodwinds

14 Battery

16ish Pit

8 Pedestrians (Show concept)

12ish Guard.

 

The other 15-20ish people are shadows or aces.