Central Texas marching band quality

[bchorn]

So what's up with the amazing quality of the Central Texas bands over the past decade? I marched at Austin Anderson High School from 86-90 and back then the only school that ever advanced to State on a regular basis was Crockett. There might be an occasional school from suburbs but Crockett was pretty much the only guarantee. Now, it seems every year there's a guaranteed 4-5 bands advancing to the state competitions with at least one making the state finals.

 

 

I know Austin has had a huge populating surge over the past 20 years (thanks to Dell). Did the other big cities drop in quality over that same time? I see that Houston and Austin don't share the same Area any more.

 

Sorry to be a newb. I haven't really paid much attention to local marching bands since I graduated so when I returned this year I was surpised how much everything has changed for the better (except for poor ole Crockett).

[Xenon]

Poor Crockett.... Ever since that 1993 season.......

[CPFrntEns]

  Xenon said:

Poor Crockett.... Ever since that 1993 season.......

 

Argh, are you guys gonna start that again? Either tell us what happened or stop bringing it up, it's really annoying!

[mellopwn1]

It's too awful to tell everyone about...believe me

 

  CPFrntEns said:

Argh, are you guys gonna start that again? Either tell us what happened or stop bringing it up, it's really annoying!

[takigan]

The population of Austin back then was more disproportional to Dallas, Fort Worth (which was moreso its own entity back then instead of being grouped up with Dallas as DFW) and Houston. So I think the Area that encompassed Austin (don't ask me which one it was....I'm assuming it was Area D but I honestly don't know), had a greater mix of either Dallas or Houston schools than they do now, and those schools were larger and more socioeconomically elite. Those schools ended up claiming most of the few bids that advanced them to State while the rest of the CenTex schools had to stay at home.

 

Back then You had Crockett and Westlake in Austin that were competitive, and even the city of Austin proper itself wasn't all that big and only had a half dozen High Schools or so....Round Rock had 2 schools (RR and Westwood), Georgetown had 1 school, Pflugerville had 1 school and Leander had 1 school (Cedar Park wouldn't be big enough to have its own school until 1998). Most of CenTex's competitiveness back then was at the 4A level and smaller, since it was a smaller area with less 5A schools.

 

The population exploded in the early 90s and, with some growth help from Killeen/Waco and San Marcos, CenTex is at a point now to where it doesn't "need any help" to be its own Area. Georgetown has 1 1/2 High schools (GHS and another called "East View" which is currently in what they call "Stage 1" that's still incorporated with GHS but will eventually become its own HS), Leander/Cedar Park have 5, Round Rock has 5, and Austin proper has around a dozen or so.

[bchorn]

Takigan,

Thanks for the overview. I knew Williamson county was one of the fastest growing counties in the nation during the 90s but never really had an idea of how much it grew until you pointed out the difference in the number of high schools between then (4) and now (11 and counting).

 

While Austin has the same number of high schools as before, I will say that the overall competitiveness in Austin proper has dropped. Yes, you have schools like Bowie and Akins but then you have schools like Travis, Reagan, Crockett, and Lanier which fields teams much much smaller than the ones I competed against back in my day. Of the four, Crockett was the only band that had a quality sound and a decent program.

Edited October 11, 2010 by bchorn

[bchorn]

So I stumbled across this link of Crockett in 89 at the Westlake Marching Festival where they finished first overall.

 

My how the mighty have fallen. Can someone please share what happened with Crockett during the 1993 show?

[the terminator]

  CPFrntEns said:

Argh, are you guys gonna start that again? Either tell us what happened or stop bringing it up, it's really annoying!

 

I know I'm dying to found out what happened because it is getting annoying.

[Xenon]

  bchorn said:

So I stumbled across this link of Crockett in 89 at the Westlake Marching Festival where they finished first overall.

 

My how the mighty have fallen. Can someone please share what happened with Crockett during the 1993 show?

 

That band used to be so extremely good.

[bchorn]

Yeah, what

[bandbot4.0]

  bchorn said:

I

[bchorn]

  atxmusic56 said:

They still do it.

They didn't do it last Saturday night when I went to the finals and I was there from beginning to end. I was listening for it as well since it was my first Westlake Festival in 20 years so I was eager to hear which bands had had success there since I left. Didn't hear it once.

Edited October 14, 2010 by bchorn

[whitewing09]

They did it my freshman year which I guess was 2005, I think they stopped after that.

[mrwood69]

  bchorn said:

They didn't do it last Saturday night when I went to the finals and I was there from beginning to end. I was listening for it as well since it was my first Westlake Festival in 20 years so I was eager to hear which bands had had success there since I left. Didn't hear it once.

 

 

They do it for prelims....

[shmeh]

  bchorn said:

They didn't do it last Saturday night when I went to the finals and I was there from beginning to end. I was listening for it as well since it was my first Westlake Festival in 20 years so I was eager to hear which bands had had success there since I left. Didn't hear it once.

 

 

Yeah, they definitely still do it.