Bob Shreffler and Rich Biver noted that drum corps judging could be a little "uneven" in the days before CSJA.

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

ooops, ended too quickly.

There were many "chapters" of the All-American judges association and there were some other groups too.
Unfortunately, they all had there own standards and training was often very lax. So .. judging was uneven from state to state and contest to contest.

It was made worse by some contests where the sponsors would select "personal friends" to judge every year. VFW was notorious for this with "Tony" Schlecta as contest chairman. The Illinois State Fair did the same thing. Some of these people were not good judges.

In Wisconsin, both Wisconsin All American and Badgerland would have people in that category. We knew who the bad ones were and sometimes even changed parts of the show to match their "biases".

In 1959, a group of younger AA judges broke away and formed CSJA. They set standards, developed strict training and examination procedures and worked closely with other like-minded associations in other parts of the country. Judging improved dramatically.

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

Badgerland - THAT was the other group!

What did you do in the Corps? Snare, Drum Major, Drum Instructor/Arranger

What years were you a Corps member? 1970-73; 78-79

Badgerland Judges. I recollect competing in several Wisconsin shows my first year in Norwood--1962. At that time the only time the Kilties beat us and the Racine Scouts came close was when we had those judges. After 1962 we seemed to avoid contests with Badgerland judges.

avoiding contests with Badgerland judges was always a good idea ...IF you were from Illinois.

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

Thinking about those days, the inconsistency in judging was another reason most corps didn't travel a lot. Why spend all the money and time (back then travel was SLOW), just to get beaten down by biased local judging.

Of course, that didn't apply much if you were a National Champion traveling through .. like St. Vincents, Blessed Sacrament, Garfield or the Cavaliers.

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

That was one of the reasons for the establishment of DCI, and it's standardization of judges. Even after CSJA was going strong, a corps might score well all summer in the Midwest, then go to Nationals out East and get buried (and I'm sure the East coast corps thought the reverse if Nationals were in Chicago, Denver, etc.). That is one positive result of DCI - judging became more even across the country. And most all CSJA judges were DCI-approved, which said a lot about CSJA.

However, DCI judges DID tend to be biased towards corps they had seen more often, which is why most Midwest corps took an early tour and a late tour (in the days before the whole summer was a tour). That's what hurt us in the Cavaliers in the mid 70s. Our money situation wasn't much better than Norwood's at times, so while we were close or ahead of Madison and Phantom at the beginning of the year, in the middle of the season they would go out East, while we stayed in Chicago and beat up on the Guardsmen and the Pioneer for two weeks. When those corps returned, we were suddendly many points down.

Of course, part of that was their rehearsing all day every day while we all had jobs and practiced two nights a week.

What did you do in the Corps? Snare, Drum Major, Drum Instructor/Arranger

What years were you a Corps member? 1970-73; 78-79

Bob, that is the whole point .. the National contests (VFW and AL) were run by people who used their "old friend" judges, NOT CSJA or any other "well trained" associations. And, yes, CSJA worked hard to connect with other judges associations.

DCI wasn't formed to solve judging problems. DCI was formed to get MONEY for drum corps. Period.

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

Dave,

I'm not sure if that's totally true. I think, like most organizations (the government, for example), DCI was formed with noble intent, but became drunk on their own power and got derailed somewhere along the way. I think it was formed mostly to give the power to the drum corps rather than the veteran's groups. It could have all been avoided if Schlecta and the others would have allowed the corps freedom in competition rules, but they were determined to stop the activity from growing and didn't realize until it was too late that they were losing the corps' loyalty in the process. While I don't always agree with the direction the activity has taken, I have always felt that it should be up to the current participants to decide what that direction should be. And as long as they're attracting an audience - which they are - it doesn't and shouldn't really matter to them who's in that audience.

I do think one of the aims of DCI was to standardize judging, so that it would be more consistent from show to show. And they certainly accomplished that, rather quickly. And CSJA was a big part of that, as you personally know. I think that association became the new standard of judging preparation and fairness. If nothing else, it gave you one less thing to worry about going into a show, although small individual differences will always exist as long as humans are doing the judging (maybe DCI's next project - robot judges?).

What did you do in the Corps? Snare, Drum Major, Drum Instructor/Arranger

What years were you a Corps member? 1970-73; 78-79

With the tick system some judges had a "tolerance" for judges, it was either together or not. When I was young, I hated the butchers without the tolerance. As I got older, I embraced that philosophy. That way I knew I was totally impartial. Fuzz=tick. Regardless of All-American, Badgerland, CSJA there was ALWAYS that inconsistency. Certain judges always had a lower execution score (for example Sam Geatty=higher score, Jim Middleton=lower score). I think it is easier to get consistency with the current subjective system.

Bob with the current participants controlling the program you are always assured of change - just like in the pop music industry (rap, hip hop or whatever). As we get older, we tend to live in the past and are more reluctant to change. It is the young or young at heart that have not lost their imagination or their willingness to adopt new ideas. My biggest gripe with the new music (drum corps or pop) is the majority don't have a melody I can keep in my head.

What did you do in the Corps? drum

What years were you a Corps member? 61-69

Which has ALWAYS been my biggest problem with "modern" drum corps. I have a music degree, and many times I can't find the melody! I can handle the visual stuff (even the guard most of the time), and I can ALMOST handle the lack of rudimental drumming (because they just can't do it running around the field like we could going up and down the 50-yard line), but PLEASE give me a tune I can whistle leaving the stadium!

What did you do in the Corps? Snare, Drum Major, Drum Instructor/Arranger

What years were you a Corps member? 1970-73; 78-79

MELODY? What's that?

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

Bob, your right. The current participants should set the direction they want to go. That's why it is called a show now and not a contest. They get it judged the way they want it done, they get audiences which results in money. What it was about in the first place.

What did you do in the Corps? Drum Major

What years were you a Corps member? 65-69 Cadets, 69-72 Imperials

One point I agree on is about the music,it would be
nice to remember the Melody.I'm sure,and I said this
once before the corps don't chose the music that
the audiences can recognize.It's a whole different
thought process now.

What did you do in the Corps? French Horn

What years were you a Corps member? 1957 thru 1963

Steve: good ideas, but the PARTICIPANTS don't set the plans and standards. It is the managers and association people. So now, it is DCI staff doing this.

Meanwhile, local community based drum corps is almost dead.

What did you do in the Corps? drummer

What years were you a Corps member? 1958-63

And of course none of them have any bias or connections to the corps.

And as local corps go, so do REAL contests.

What did you do in the Corps? Drum Major

What years were you a Corps member? 65-69 Cadets, 69-72 Imperials