Vista Ridge Marching Festival

[bchorn]

Westlake is definitely legit. I wasn't a fan of their show last year so had a little bit of bias against them. However, they quickly won me over last night. Their woodwinds had an amazingly fast run at one point that made one of the judges laugh with disbelief. I know this because i was sitting right in front of the judges in their roped off section at the top of the stadium. Their sound was big and bold.

 

 

The stadium was a great venue. They only have a few kinks to work out for next year.

 

1. Concessions had run out of food by the time finals started.

 

2. They need to find more remote locations for the bands to warm up. Several quiet moments for the performing bands were marred by other bands warming up.

[longhornsax]

An interesting fact that I don't think has been pointed out yet, is that Area D is hosted by this same stadium. Explains why so many 4A contenders were at this contest.

[Zurflu]

  bchorn said:

The stadium was a great venue. They only have a few kinks to work out for next year.

 

1. Concessions had run out of food by the time finals started.

 

2. They need to find more remote locations for the bands to warm up. Several quiet moments for the performing bands were marred by other bands warming up.

 

Also, no water after finals = 200 zombies wandering around hopelessly thirsty

[shmeh]

I was pretty suprised with Vandegrift receiving first in auxilary. I really think that for auxilary, they should be required to use flags, rifles, or other props to get first, rather than just having a "dance team". Not to negate a job well done by Vandegrift, it's just my opinion.

[Xenon]

  shmeh said:

I was pretty suprised with Vandegrift receiving first in auxilary. I really think that for auxilary, they should be required to use flags, rifles, or other props to get first, rather than just having a "dance team". Not to negate a job well done by Vandegrift, it's just my opinion.

 

Dance Teams work just as hard as and sometimes even harder than a colorguard to create effective color and visual interest in a show. It is just that they are different. And different can be good.

[shmeh]

  Xenon said:

Dance Teams work just as hard as and sometimes even harder than a colorguard to create effective color and visual interest in a show. It is just that they are different. And different can be good.

 

But I think it's harder for a color guard to run around the field, dance at the same time, and manipulate flags and other props really well than it is for a dance team to have a few "bam" moments with a quick flash of their dress.

[Xenon]

  shmeh said:

But I think it's harder for a color guard to run around the field, dance at the same time, and manipulate flags and other props really well than it is for a dance team to have a few "bam" moments with a quick flash of their dress.

 

Then you aren't considering all the things that the dance team is doing. It isn't just color, it is movement. It is dance. It is expressing the ideas of the show. Very few colorguards have anything near the dancing, fluidity of movement, and knowledge of what their bodies are doing that good dance teams have.

 

LD Bell's guard is one of the great examples. Look at how much they dance and how little that they use weapons. Even when they have flags in their hands, they are merely using them as extensions of their dancing bodies, not as things to swing/toss.

 

If you watch LD Bell's guard, it is absolutely amazing how hard they work. They work harder than a fast paced Zumba class and they are much more beautiful doing it.

[shmeh]

  Xenon said:

Then you aren't considering all the things that the dance team is doing. It isn't just color, it is movement. It is dance. It is expressing the ideas of the show. Very few colorguards have anything near the dancing, fluidity of movement, and knowledge of what their bodies are doing that good dance teams have.

 

LD Bell's guard is one of the great examples. Look at how much they dance and how little that they use weapons. Even when they have flags in their hands, they are merely using them as extensions of their dancing bodies, not as things to swing/toss.

 

If you watch LD Bell's guard, it is absolutely amazing how hard they work. They work harder than a fast paced Zumba class and they are much more beautiful doing it.

 

Well first in music, marching, and auxilary should= first in GE as well in my opinion. But this is why I am not a judge.

[melody]

  bchorn said:

Westlake is definitely legit. I wasn't a fan of their show last year so had a little bit of bias against them. However, they quickly won me over last night. Their woodwinds had an amazingly fast run at one point that made one of the judges laugh with disbelief. I know this because i was sitting right in front of the judges in their roped off section at the top of the stadium. Their sound was big and bold.

 

 

The stadium was a great venue. They only have a few kinks to work out for next year.

 

1. Concessions had run out of food by the time finals started.

 

2. They need to find more remote locations for the bands to warm up. Several quiet moments for the performing bands were marred by other bands warming up.

 

There are several more kinks on my list, but that second item on your list is huge. As a spectator, it was nearly impossible to enjoy the shows musically when every measure of rest, woodwind feature, soloist, and pianissimo moment was overwhelmed by the percussion and brass, or the electronic microphones and metronomes, coming from behind me. Many people around me in the stands commented as well. I can't imagine being the music judge, and although I haven't seen any of the score breakdowns, I would question their accuracy under these circumstances. If I were a band director, I would consider not coming back to this competition based solely on this issue.

[Drum major]

  Zurflu said:

Also, no water after finals = 200 zombies wandering around hopelessly thirsty

 

Unacceptable! This is a huge oversite that should never have happened. There were kids dying of thirst - only few kids had water in their bags. Kids were running to the water fountains to drink. Not a pretty site.

[Drum major]

  melody said:

There are several more kinks on my list, but that second item on your list is huge. As a spectator, it was nearly impossible to enjoy the shows musically when every measure of rest, woodwind feature, soloist, and pianissimo moment was overwhelmed by the percussion and brass, or the electronic microphones and metronomes, coming from behind me. Many people around me in the stands commented as well. I can't imagine being the music judge, and although I haven't seen any of the score breakdowns, I would question their accuracy under these circumstances. If I were a band director, I would consider not coming back to this competition based solely on this issue.

 

I agree, you could also hear the director with a "mike" talking to the kids. I actually heard a director say "you've got a job to do..this is your chance, yadda, yadda, yadda" all of this going on during the peformance of the band playing on the field. Very distracting for not only the band, spectators but I can assume also the judges.

I understand this is their first contest, but it's like a new resturant in town.. you don't get many first chances before people stop coming.

[weasleby]

  Drum major said:

I agree, you could also hear the director with a "mike" talking to the kids. I actually heard a director say "you've got a job to do..this is your chance, yadda, yadda, yadda" all of this going on during the peformance of the band playing on the field. Very distracting for not only the band, spectators but I can assume also the judges.

I understand this is their first contest, but it's like a new resturant in town.. you don't get many first chances before people stop coming.

 

 

Absolutely agree. To hear the other band directors, metronomes and full band warm ups really ruined some big moments for some of the bands. How the bands on the field could concentrate on their own performances, I can't imagine. Have been a spectator at a lot of competitions, but have never observed distractions from other bands warming up being this bad.

[rebelstrike]

  weasleby said:

Absolutely agree. To hear the other band directors, metronomes and full band warm ups really ruined some big moments for some of the bands. How the bands on the field could concentrate on their own performances, I can't imagine. Have been a spectator at a lot of competitions, but have never observed distractions from other bands warming up being this bad.

 

Truthfully it wasn't too bad, I don't know if I was just too into the performance, but until my sister told me and I heard it while we were watching other bands, I didn't even notice! Not having water sort of hurt though.

 

And does anyone have a full finals recap? I heard that we won Aux in finals.

Edited October 16, 2011 by rebelstrike

[LHSTrombone]

  bchorn said:

Westlake is definitely legit. I wasn't a fan of their show last year so had a little bit of bias against them. However, they quickly won me over last night. Their woodwinds had an amazingly fast run at one point that made one of the judges laugh with disbelief. I know this because i was sitting right in front of the judges in their roped off section at the top of the stadium. Their sound was big and bold.

 

 

The stadium was a great venue. They only have a few kinks to work out for next year.

 

1. Concessions had run out of food by the time finals started.

 

2. They need to find more remote locations for the bands to warm up. Several quiet moments for the performing bands were marred by other bands warming up.

Yeah, I'd have to agree on the 2nd issue.. Like even just being in warm up and being so close to another band made it almost impossible to hear our director's directions (for me at least)... There was one point during our finals warm up that one of the bands (I'm not sure who it was, they were being us and I was trying to not miss directions..) started testing one of their speakers and started playing music.. Heh, at one point there were at least 3 different mets running at the same time, and half the band got confused listening to the wrong met...

Though I do want to give props to all the bands, warming up and on the field, for trying to work through distractions like that.

[drummerjoe]

  Drum major said:

Unacceptable! This is a huge oversite that should never have happened. There were kids dying of thirst - only few kids had water in their bags. Kids were running to the water fountains to drink. Not a pretty site.

 

Yea, Round Rock sent a girl away on an ambulance due to dehydration, and several others fainted after finals.

[mrwood69]

pr0tip: drink water for breakfast.

[drummerjoe]

  mrwood69 said:

pr0tip: drink water for breakfast.

 

Yep. We only had freshmen faint, the upperclassmen know a bit better

[CPFrntEns]

Recaps are up on RR's website now (DragonBand.com, click on "Marching Competition Link").