A Big Day for Marching Bands

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JLGORMAN
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A Big Day for Marching Bands

Post by JLGORMAN » Thu Oct 20, 2016 8:41 am

Saturday the 22nd of Oct is the height of Marching Contests season in Texas. This Saturday over 900 High School Band will compete at 31 different locations for UIL Marching Contest Ratings, and in the case of Class AAAA & AAAAAA Bands the chance to advance to the Area Contests on 29 Oct.

Each Region chooses how to hold their contests. In two regions, 14 and 6, both having 44 Bands in each Region, these have been divided into 4 different sites for each of these regions due to travel and time. In these two cases, most of the sites only have 11 or 12 schools performing.

In contrast Region 21 will host 41 HS Bands at Stephen F. Austin University in Nacogdoches for a very long day of Band performances. A close Second is Region 1 in Amarillo with 37 High School Bands performing at that Regional.

The growth in Band Programs in TX has caused the UIL to go from 28 regions in 2015 to 33 Regions in 2016. Based on growth estimates by 2020 there will be 36 Regions serving Bands in the State.

This large amount of Regionals has led to a Shortage of Judges qualified to Judge UIL Marching Contests. UIL Judges are members of TMAA and to judge Marching Contest, each of the judges has to have been an active Band Director in TX for at Least 5 years, with consecutive First Division Ratings for three years in a Row and also advancement to Area and State Marching Contests.

Due to this shortage, this fall contests have been held on 15, 18, & 19 Oct already and contests will also be held on 24 25, 26 Oct next week.
Most weekday contests have been held in Suburban communities outside of the Big Cities. Most of the Rural Regions still do things this Saturday. The Best part is that entrance to all contests are free.
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Jim Bunselmeier
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Re: A Big Day for Marching Bands

Post by Jim Bunselmeier » Fri Oct 21, 2016 2:53 pm

Are the powers that be considering bringing in judges from outside of Texas?

JLGORMAN
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Re: A Big Day for Marching Bands

Post by JLGORMAN » Fri Oct 21, 2016 10:45 pm

Interestingly enough, the State Marching Championships have had out of state judges for many years. Usually 5 of the 10 Judges are from out of state(5 do the 4A & 5 do 6A and the one group will do prelims, the other group does finals).

Most of the time it has worked, however in 2014, Claudia Taylor Johnson won the BOA San Antonio Contest going away. I had watched there show, which was heavy on visual, and weaker musically than Marcus, who I believed would win UIL. In the prelims at UIL, of the 5 judges, Johnson was rated, 8th, 9th, 3rd, 5th and 24th. The ranking of 24th came from the Judge who was Director of Marching Bands for a major SEC University(WAR Eagle). He was not impressed with the heavy use of props. I think that his being from out of State did not help Johnson, who ended up 3rd in the Finals. Marcus did win the UIL 6A Contest and in my opinion was better under UIL Standards than CTJ, however CTJ was a better Band under BOA Standards.

I think that TX could eventually consider out of state Judges for the Region Contests, however, and this is a big thing, the judges would have to be well aware of UIL Standards. In TX almost 1400 schools compete in UIL Regional contests, the numbers of these schools that do either BOA or US Bands probably does not number more than 200 schools. Several directors complained this year that at contests conducted by both BOA and US Bands, outside judges did not understand the relationship of the UIL Music Program. UIL IS THE MUSIC PROGRAM IN TX. It is not one of many circuits Most TX Bands use both US BAnds & BOA events to sharpen their programs for UIL. Some of the Bands(not many) have complained that a few of the out of state judges did not have a grasp of how important UIL is to our Bands.
I forsee that UIL will probably open the Area Contests to out of state judges who pass tests administered by TMAA. My feellng is that if the judges are qualified, and understand UIL Standards for Region Marching Contests, they should be considered for assignment. However as in every organization the Powers that be will run the judges into the ground, traveling from Dallas on Wednesday, over 450 miles to Amarillo for Saturday, or having to sit through 41 Bands(more than I think anyone should have to sit through at a contest). I realize all Western had 72 Bands, however that Was PARADE and not field which is a different animal.
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Re: A Big Day for Marching Bands

Post by Hostrauser » Sat Oct 22, 2016 9:05 am

JLGORMAN wrote:Most of the time it has worked, however in 2014, Claudia Taylor Johnson won the BOA San Antonio Contest going away. I had watched there show, which was heavy on visual, and weaker musically than Marcus, who I believed would win UIL.
Just clarifying the record:

In 2014 at BOA San Antonio Prelims, CTJ was given the highest musical individual score (Carl Bly), the highest musical ensemble score (Chip Crotts), and the highest musical effect scores by both judges (Scott Atchison and Jay Webb). In Finals, they had the highest musical ensemble score (Paul McGarr), and the highest musical effect score from judge #2 (Kenneth Snoek) and the highest sum of both musical effect judges. 6 of 8 music judges thought CTJ was the best musical performance of the competition.

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Re: A Big Day for Marching Bands

Post by JLGORMAN » Sat Oct 22, 2016 11:32 am

The writer is correct, however to understand what I meant by difference between BOA & UIL is that three days later in the AlamoDome a different panel of Judges saw things very differentlly.
Prelims (Scoring by Ordinals)
Marcus 11
CTJ 45

Finals Using a different Panel of Judges
Marcus 10
CTJ 21

According to UIL Archives, not one of the 10 judges on the two panels voted for CTJ as the TOP Band. Two Judges voted Marcus NO. 1 in Prelims, 3 voted Marcus Number 1 in the Finals

In both cases the two different Panels clearly felt Marcus was the Better Band. I think CTJ is a great Band, however when the Scoring is 60% music Marcus excels at this. That is why it is very difficult for a Band to do both contests within a three day period.

Five of the 10 judges for UIL were from out of Texas. One 5 judge panel did the prelims, the other did the finals. The Group doing the 6A Prelims had done the 4A Finals. The 6A Finals panel had done the 4A prelims. The UIL Panels are heavier on University Band Directors than BOA probably is. Thus maybe a bias against large props shows.
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JLGORMAN
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Re: A Big Day for Marching Bands

Post by JLGORMAN » Tue Oct 25, 2016 11:57 am

The UIL just announced its adjudication Panels for the UIL AAAA & AAAAAA State Marching Championships on 7 & 8 Nov at the Alamodome in San Antonio, TX

4A Prelims on 7 Nov
Chris Brannan Mineola ISD
Dick Clardy Fort Worth, ISD
Scott Coulson Mesquite ISD (Retired)
Jim Cude Whitesboro ISD
Steven Moore Lindale, ISD

4A Finals 7 Nov
Keith Bearden Texas Tech University (Retired)
Levi Chavez Frisco ISD
Jeremy Earnhart Arlington ISD (SMC & BOA Winner with LD Bell)
WL Whaley Pomona, CO (Retired)
Nick Williams University of North Texas

6A Prelims on 8 Nov
Levi Chavez
Jeremy Earnhart
David Wandewalker Fulton County Schools, Atlanta, GA
WL Whaley
Nick Williams

6A Finals 8 Nov
Scott Coulson
Darrin Davis Broken Arrow HS, OK
Monte Mast Klein ISD
Ron Morrison Hays CISD
Tom Shine Duncanville (3 times SMC Champions) Retired
Deep in the Heart of Texas. Home of the III Mobile Armored Corps and the 1st Cavalry Division, serving America in Iraq

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