Welcome to Gaia! ::

When you get to listen to the tapes from competitions, do they have anything interesting to say?

For instance, we had the same guy judging music at two different competitions. The first time, he made several comments in each song about how the trumpets need to blend with the rest of the band. In the second one, he might as well have copied the first tape, only replacing 'trumpets' with 'bass drums.'

At another competition, the most memorable commentary comes from the percussion judge. Of course, he noticed one of the drumline carrying two bass drums (since we only have three bass drummers and it sounds so much better with all four drums).

But that's not the best part. I play in the pit, usually on our one ancient (both in age and looks) marimba. At one point, the judge was examining the instrument for a moment. That kinda had me wondering if points could be taken off for the condition of the instruments, although it's not like I can really help it, belonging to pretty much the cheapest school in the state. Anyway, I couldn't hear him then, but I found out later that he said something like:
"You shouldn't bring your practice marimba to competitions." xd

My BD thought that was just rude, but our pit sure got a kick out of it. wink

So, anyway, does anybody else have any good commentary to share?

Tee hee. At the beginning of our show, we have some body work and the judge was commenting on how a flute needed to keep it's horn up and then he said, "Whoops! That's a trombone." Needless to say the band got a kick out of that. It was cute.

They always so the most obvious stuff that u already know was wrong.,..(whats with that) they try not to make them looks stupid by saying or not saying something that u could use help on or u may not need help on that he may have just been wrong...

Last year one guy dedected 10 poiints off our drum major for having a little spot of mud on her shoe.. and it was the first festival we went to and she had to march across the feild and the feild was all muddy from a hurricane that passed threw here 2 days before... and right after us they didnt let anyone go on the feild because it was too muddy... go figure that one out... rolleyes

Once the percussion judge said this: "What are those medal things... Oh jacks I get it! Those are cute, and balls? Oh jacks and Balls that's creative, And A...F...0...5... Oh A.F. '05 that's so cool! And look they are making a circle how cool!"

xd
He didn't even pay attention to the percussion. And the only reason that our band didn't get the percussion award is because the other band gave him goose bumps. rolleyes

One year we got a really bad tape and score for our entire band, but mainly the pit and drumline because the judge had a grudge against our school, I don't remember what for. My band director ended up swearing at the judge and telling him he was unfair and bias and that he was going to write the people in charge of judging. Let's just say he never judged our band after that, from what I know.

Nya, for those who aren't from where I am and don't know this, SCSBOA judges are always old, senile, retired band directors who still think they know music. My PT trainer even commented about it one day, it's just so true.

Anyway, our show is 'Phobia', it's a really nifty and the drill is awesome. In the first movement, Claustorphobia, we move into the really really REALLY small box to play our final chord. This one judge just kinda went quiet for a moment and said 'I don't get it.' on the tape. >_>'

In our second movement, Arachniphobia, we're at a halt and there's this ripple effect we do starting at both sides of the field so that it leads to Kat who then stomps on the groudn to make it look like she smashed the spider. Now, the whole point of the ripple is to draw attention to Kat, and EVERY judge got it. Well, save for the one previously mentioned, he commented, "Well you have this nice ripple effect and then nothing. You should really think about adding something in to that."

Nya, some people are so clueless. Oh, but there was also one judge who really amused us when he spent like twenty seconds on the tape trying to pronounce 'minimal'.

Oh, and also at state, we had this one judge's tape sounding like Chicago (really windy) and while we were listening to it, someone goes "Man, I didn't know it was that windy out there!!" and yesterday at Ankeny I had a judge stalking me!! AHhh!! And I accidentally backed into one of my fellow flutists, so I bet he noticed that...uh oh I'm in trouble now!! More on this story....tomorrow!! Once we listen to el judgo tapos!!

Well we were listening to a tape from the Director of Evergreen Marching band from Vancouver washington (he judged us on group music (prelims) and indivual marching(finals)) and he's like yeah that spot was just Milk toast and everyone just fell down laughing so hard wo couldn't tell if it was a complement or a dis. We also had another judge who talked like this Yourearealyneedto workonyouyourummmmmmm....*mumbles about what it's called* articulation.It was so hard to understand but SOOOOOOO funny