Isn’t there a clip of phantom practicing firebird while just running across a field? Sure, average talent goes up, but that’s still so impressive and took so much time to remove the shakiness.
As someone who marched a JD Shaw hornline at SCV... the difficulty of the brass book really varied between instruments. I don't really blame the judges for thinking the way they did about us in 2017, though it would've been nice to get a little more GE credit because those soloists could absolutely shed while marching and being thrown around on moving props. JD's mellophone parts are some of the hardest to play in the activity, whereas his trumpet parts had plenty of donuts, with some unison licks sprinkled here and there (pun not intended). He'd write killer licks for the baritones and groovy walking bass lines for the contras. In order of technical difficulty imo, it was mellos, baritones, contras, trumpets (can't speak too much for low brass since it's based on what I'd hear in rehearsals). His writing has become more balanced in difficulty recently ever since he went back to PR, which I'm really happy for those who get to experience equally challenging music across sections!
I played G key Horns then. The reason why DCI went to B flat is because it opened up a large space for more modern music. The old horns had only 2 valves. It became difficult for the writers to make it work. The G horns were certainly louder. Which is why they increased the number of corp members.
You’re neglecting the entire decade of the 1990s, when three-valve G bugles were used - fully chromatic, completely capable of any repertoire that was thrown at them, in any key. The reason that they switched to Bb/F brass was resale value and ease of acquiring instruments.
Funny, the Bluecoats version of that song with its groove is reminiscent of the early 1990's Crossmen grooves especially 1992. It's the way the underlying beat implies a quarternote groove with a 16th note riff in the brass, rather than a less groovy eighth note beat over 16th note riff. Wish Crossmen had thought of playing it like Coats did, they could have score higher with it I think.
If you do this again you should do cadets and bluecoats bridge over troubled water. I don’t think it’s in their shows, but they both have their own take on it.
I personally can hear quite a difference between the G bugles and Bb instruments. You're right in that the Bbs sound more round and less rough than the G bugles, but it is definitely more top-heavy whereas the G bugles sound more unified between the different voices. While Phantom's performance of the firebird had more layers that fit well with each other, the lower voices were buried underneath the trumpet melody. I can barely hear this countermelody from the baritones that if much more present would've made the performance even more fantastic. Meanwhile, the Cavalier's had a more unified sound with each individual part being just as present as one another. I can hear the tubas just as well as the sopranos. This could be due to the different horns in the G bugle family being of the same sound quality while the Bb/F horns differ from one another somewhat. Of course they're all brass instruments, but trumpets by nature are a cylindrical instrument and produce a more straightforward sound while all the other horns are conical and produce a more wider sound. This is why trumpets (in my opinion) stick out and bury the other sub-sections in modern drum corps. Of course both eras of DCI have their merits and I do love that modern sound, but I can totally understand someone when they say that G bugles have a better sound.
@@CJsMusicTrumpet Haha no worries! I marched during the G bugle era, and did enjoy their distinctive sound. But today’s horn lines still sound amazing. Probably, as was mentioned, due to the extremely high talent levels of today’s marching members. And though I am a Phantom Regiment alumnus, I really enjoyed Blue Knights arrangement of Firebird as well.
Idk if Blast counts as drum corps but they did a ton of Star of Indiana’s old arrangements like Villa Borghese, which a ton of other corps have done since Star did it.
Having marched the Firebird show for the Cavaliers in 97, the version you need to compare to phantom is 88 Cavaliers..... the 97 version was designed to be much closer to the orchestral version...where as 88 was more of a drum corps version.
