Thanks to Dave Cole on r.a.m.d for this review!
3000 square feet of scenery towering over 20 feet high!
This most striking affect of the Cadet's 1996 show is evident even
when you're a quarter mile away. They are fielding 10 huge prop carts
(15' long and 6' wide) with scaffolding at least 20' high. Scenery
tarps are hanging from the scaffolding - each tower has a lower
curtain around 12' high and 15' wide (secured at all four corners) and
an upper curtain around 8' high and 15' wide (secured only at the top
two corners). They each have two outrigger style metal posts sticking
out front almost touching the ground to prevent frontwards tipping.
The curtains are decorated with a blue splotchy pattern that
is reminiscent of clouds (so says my artistic wife).
The most amazing thing is that these curtain towers don't just stay
put during the Cadet's show - they move around at times during each
piece. It takes at least 3 people to move each one pushing just
from behind.
Normally, the Cadets run their preview show by doing their full show
once at standstill and then once with the drill, but this year they
ran the show with drill twice. "We're a little bit behind this year
because of these monstrosities on the field... they've slowed us down
a little bit." George Hopkins, the director of the Cadets, said.
"We've only done two complete run-throughs... It took till today for
them not to fall down, which is why the tops aren't attached. We
haven't quite figured out what to do yet."
These towers explain why they're traveling with 3 tractor trailers
this year. They need 15 people to put the curtain towers together and
take them down each day - they have 8 people so far, so if you'd like
to go on tour with the Cadets and be a roadie, call their office.
George hosted the Cadets Preview Show held in Riggin Stadium in
Rutherford, New Jersey on Sunday, June 16th (George - I hope you don't
mind that I've included a bunch of quotes from what you shared with
the crowd that evening.) My wife and I attended along with maybe two
hundred other fans for a sneak preview at the Cadets' 1996 "The
American West" show. The turnout was excellent given that the location
changed only 2 days before. At 4 p.m. on Friday, they found out that
Bergenfield H.S. wasn't available (some kind of permit disagreement)
and the East Rutherford/Carlstadt Board of Ed. came through on short
notice so the Cadets could use this field just west of the
Meadowlands.
Before I get to a review of their show, here are a few interesting
tidbits that George shared with the crowd:
- The Department of Animal Welfare nixed the Cadets' Cow Chip Bingo
(people pay $5 for a 1 yard by 1 yard square on the football field
and you'd win $2500 if the cow deposits its "chip" on your plot).
"We decided to turn the cow into hamburgers," George quipped, "and
not take the $7500 fine." Appropriately, the corps had just been
fed hamburgers and hot dogs. They'll be turning it into a normal
raffle instead.
- The Cadets recorded all of their music for this year's show back
around Memorial Day and it's available on compact disc along with
the Blue Devils' 1996 show music (also included are the shows from
last year's finals which have been remixed). They also have a 2-CD
set of the 13 DCI championship-winning shows of the two corps. Call
the Cadets at 201-384-8822 to order. George said these CDs would
finally be in this week.
- More info about the Cadets' performance at the closing ceremonies
for the Summer Olympics in Atlanta: It'll be on world-wide TV at
9 p.m. Eastern time on Sunday, August 4th. At the Cadets home show
on July 6th in Clifton, the Cadets will likely perform the "skit"
that they'll be doing at the Olympics along with the "guest
performer from New York." The Cadets have done 6 or 7 days of work
on this already, and "the gentlemen" is going on tour with them
next week to work some more together. "It's not going to be just
drum corps" George said, "We do get to do about two minutes of
what we do and then we get to do about four minutes of what other
people do. But the bottom line is that we end up in front of
3.6 billion people (that's the anticipated TV audience) watching
the corps for about six minutes." A big round of applause followed.
No additional hints though as to who they'll be performing with.
Any guesses?
- The Cadets will also be performing at the Major League Baseball
All-Star game in Philadelphia on July 9th and at the Major League
Soccer All-Star game on July 14th at Giants Stadium.
The Cadets 1996 show is entitled "The American West". It's comprised
of several different scenes which aren't really related to each other,
although they are all related to the West; there's no continuing story
this year.
1) "Promise of Living" from the opera "A Tender Land" by Aaron Copland
"For a change, we start with our ballad first" George said.
It begins with the entire corps hidden behind the curtain towers
playing for several bars before a trio of horns emerges midfield,
followed by the guard entering from the right, no equipment, doing
Martha-Grahamish/Agnes de Mille-ish type dance (hey, what the heck
do I know about dance?) The guard wears light tan shirts with dark
tan pants for the guys and dark tan leggings for the gals. The rest
of the corps enters, except for the battery who only perform as
prop movers during this opening piece.
This number starts very softly and builds and builds for about two
minutes into a huge, full wall of sound. The horn push at the end
is fantastic! Very uplifting! There's a short diminuendo before the
next scene starts. This entire section sets the mood nicely.
By the end, all of the curtain towers have moved from being
clustered on the right of the field to being spread out back of the
entire field. George noted, "To impress people, you can point out
the subtle movement in this piece from East (right side of the
field) to West (left side of the field), just like how the American
West was won."
In an interview with Jay Bocook in the Cadets Insider, Jay said
"Finding that special piece of music sets the whole creative
process in motion, and gives us a focus for everything else to grow
out of. This year, Hop was interested in exploring a Russian show.
Marc came ready to go western! The straw that broke the camel's
back was when Hop heard 'Promise of Living'."
This section lasts about 2.5 minutes.
Liner notes from the CD: "A Tender Land" premiered in 1954 and it's
set in the 1930's and involves a farm family - a mother, her two
daughters, and a grandfather. It's spring harvest time and two
drifters arrive seeking work. One of them falls in love with the
elder daughter and, after her high-school graduation, they run
off together. But he changes his mind and steals into the night
with his fellow hobo. The jilted daughter ultimately decides to
leave home anyway; at the opera's end, her mother looks to the
younger daughter to continue the tradition of the family.
"Promise of Living" is a quintet from the end of Act I.
2) "Tulsa" (a.k.a. "Tulsa: A Portrait in Oil") by Don Gillis
"Our traditional drum corps piece" George said. He asked the crowd
for a show of hands of those so-called "traditionalists" who
disagree with his views on electronics and such, and to the few who
raised their hands he said "This piece is for you. The props get
out of the way. There's lots of notes, lots of drumming, moving
around, and throwing things in the air."
The battery joins in immediately from behind the curtains and the
corps winds up into this driving chart. Rifle, saber, and flag
guard sections are featured. The flags have tan silhouettes of a
mountain range. Included is a mellophone section soli and a ton of
notes (some a bit rough at the moment) in addition to the rapid
movement.
This section lasts about 2 minutes.
3) "Gunfight" (none of the info I've seen mentioned this piece and
George didn't say where it came from. Is it just part of "Tulsa"?)
If the preceding section is for traditionalists, George says he
gets his revenge with this piece: "Our most intriguing". They have
30 in the rifle line for this! There's a slower/softer introduction
first - to "reload" before the gunfight :-) with a soprano,
mellophone, and bari trio. And then it becomes "hell on wheels"!
The curtain towers move in closer - visually next to each other
from side to side but staggered slightly front to back. There's a
huge 30 rifle toss - thrown from a straight 6 by 5 person block
and then caught in a staggered, offset block. Way cool! The guard
adds bandanas over their faces to look like bandits.
(Also tucked in here is a quote from another ?Copland? piece, but I
can't for the life of me place what music it's from...)
A pit solo starts the percussion feature (Stereo timpani! - a set
on the left and a set on the right) while the corps disappears
behind the curtain towers except for the snare line on the left
with a rifle group behind for the snare solo. Then, the tenors on
the right appear for their solo with a rifle group behind, and
lastly the bass drum line comes straight down the middle for their
solo. This percussion feature lasts a full 45 seconds without any
horns - a little different than the past few years. All of the
sections were very impressive to us horn players.
The entire rifle line is featured while the contras appear from
behind the curtain towers for a soli line from the left, followed
by the sopranos from the right. The entire corps "corrals" the
rifle line for another mass rifle toss - this time caught with one
knee on the ground. The rifle line splits into two factions and the
gunfight is about to erupt - the music builds into a frenzy - when
the town drunk interrupts and the show segues into the hoe-down.
This whole piece is fast and raucous. George said they still have
to work out how to focus the visual better on the gunfighters and
the drunken fellow.
This section lasts about 2.5 minutes.
4) "Hoe-down" from the ballet "Rodeo" by Aaron Copland
George explained that the curtain towers will eventually be turned
around for this number - a barn will be painted on the left
curtains and a saloon will be on the right. This section is a lot
like "Swing, Swing, Swing", last year's novelty number, but this
year the horn line doesn't just stand around - there's quite a bit
of choreographed movement.
A solo baritone introduces the melody with a background of slide
whistle, pop gun, train whistle, and a "Moooo!" using a field
marking cone as a megaphone from the pit. The Hoe-down starts up
in the barn - using six stomp boxes this year - a feature for six guys
dancing and then six gals with sabers. The full corps revs the tune
up into a soli for three contras on the front sidelines. Jay Bocook
indicated that parts of "Tulsa" would be blended in with "Hoe-down"
and I think that begins with the contra feature. The rest of the
horns then form a very tight diamond moving straight across the
field and scream out their answering line.
The battery appears from behind the curtains, but now the snares
have washboards in their snare holders, the tenors are playing
slap sticks, and the bass drummers are on washtub basses! There's a
big washboard feature! While this is going on, the town drunk
leaves the hoe-down, steals a soprano and tries to play it while
the horn player attempts to get it back. At the same time the rest
of the horns all get down with some fancy choreographed knee
slapping! The tipsy drunk attempts to get a flag from a guard
member but is restrained and then he makes his way to the bar on
the right where a brawl eventually ensues.
The music for this slows down and then launches into the famous
Hoe-down riffs at lightning speed! Yes, the pit does get their
crack at the incredibly hard licks in these riffs, but it's mainly
carried by the horns - and they're playing all the 16ths that are
scored too - not simplified! Man-o-man, that's one swinging section
for the horns! Wow! This entire segment is a lot of fun and very
humorous.
Since this tune is popularly known from the TV commercials for the
National Cattlemen's Beef Association and Beef Board, my wife and I
think that, after the final big hit, the crowd should shout out:
"Beef - It's What's for Dinner!" ;-)
This section lasts about 2.5 minutes.
Liner notes from the CD: "Rodeo" premiered in 1942 and was
choreographed by Agnes de Mille. "Hoe-down" is the final of the
four parts in this ballet. In the interior of a ranch, couples
swirl gaily by the Cowgirl, still dressed in her outfit of pants
and skirt, who watches them disconsolately. No one offers to
dance with her; she even is left out of the community dancing.
When she sees the Head Wrangler and the Rancher's Daughter
dancing cheek to cheek, she runs off the scene. But, in a short
while, she returns, completely transformed: She has put on a
dress, fixed a bow in her hair and has proved to the guests (who
gaze at her in astonishment) that she can be as pretty a girl as
any in the room. Immediately, she finds the cowboys competing for
her attention. Although the Head Wrangler offers to dance with
her, she decides to accept another cowboy - the only one who had
shown some kindness to her before she had emerged from her
cocoon. "Hoe-down" is largely built from the square dance tune
"Bonyparte".
5) "Happy Endings" from the film score to "The Red Pony" by Aaron
Copland
"I have to apologize for the next 32 counts. It's awful." George
explained, "It's holding space right now, so kind of shut your eyes,
talk to your children... and in about 32 bars you can start
listening again". And, you know what, he was right! P.U.! This 6/8
echo bit did not sound good at all. But, at the hit that followed,
you could tell that was part of the good stuff! Whoa - what a
difference in sound from what they're getting rid of and what
they're keeping!
The curtain towers move to the back of the field out of the way.
A soprano solo leads into another percussion feature (another 15
seconds of only drums!). There's lots of fast movement and music.
The guard disappears behind curtain towers back right and they
reemerge with a new set of colorful flags - several different solid
colors. The show ends with a slow company front, the guard (all
with flags) surrounding the back and sides of the corps, and a
short frenetic tag.
This section lasts about 3 minutes.
Liner notes from the CD: "The Red Pony" was released in 1948. It
was the second film Copland scored that was based on a Steinbeck
book and directed by Lewis Milestone (the other was "Of Mice and
Men"). Steinbeck's story presents a series of vignettes about
a 10-year-old boy, his life on a California ranch, and his
father's gift of a red pony. Copland said "The kind of emotions
that Steinbeck evokes in this story are basically musical ones,
since they deal so much with the unexpressed feelings of daily
living." Also, "Although some of the melodies may sound rather
folk-like, the are actually mine. There are no quotations of
folklore anywhere in the work."
Approximate numbers: guard = 30, contras = 12 (seems to be the biggest
& best Cadets' contra line in a while), baritones = 20, mellos = 12,
sops = 20, snares = 7, tenors = 4, bass drums = 5, pit = 10?, drum
majors = 2. I only noticed 4 or 5 girls in the horn line, which seems
to be fewer than last year. At least 2 people were on crutches and a
couple of others also sat out during the drill.
Overall, this is a wonderful show - very entertaining with lots of
potential for improving the thrills. It looks like it would be very
fun and challenging for all of the sections.
The curtain towers are effective in focusing attention to the field
and in establishing the mood of the show. But this early in the season
they seem to be rather hard to control (along with the obvious
concerns over how they'll do in high winds or how manageable they'll
be on a rough field.)
Percussion is featured more than in the past few years, so that should
help for a better perception from those concerned about the grounding
of drums in the ballad. (Oh yeah, in case you were wondering about the
effects of the new DCE rule - the Cadets don't have any electronics in
their pit).
The horn line has a hot (and hard!!) book from start to finish which
will show off the Cadets' stamina. They don't "stand around" as much
this year which should address some of the comments about 1995. The
guard is phenomenal as usual - the 30 member rifle line is a big
treat. And, there weren't any spills or noticeable collisions even
though they're already zooming. Given all of the time that they've had
to spend preparing their parts for the Olympics, I was very impressed
with how far along this show is.
Yippee-i-o-ki-ay!
Dave Cole
CadetsFan@aol.com
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