I bet that got your attention.
The title of this post is a tribute to the 2nd most exciting event of the day.
Freshly back from the Honda the Prunester is here to give you the play by play of everything that happened at this year's Honda Battle of the Bands.
Let me start by saying that the Honda Battle of the Bands is a great event for all lovers of Showstyle bands and music lovers in general. If you love Showstyle Bands I would absolutely recommend that you set aside time and money to go to this event.
Prunalysis Disclaimer:
1. The Prunalysis is a completely non-biased review of the events at a Showstyle Marching Band performance.
2. It is never meant to be malicious but I don’t pull punches either.
3. Response and help in naming songs is highly appreciated.
The main goal is to tell it like it is.
1st Up - Morehouse College
Replies
"Morehouse College"
Of all the bands at the event this was the two gave ranked in vastly different places according to who was judging them. Morehouse was one of these bands. I've heard peoples comments range from saying that were highly disappointed in the home band performances to ranking them in the top performances of the day.
Sadly, I missed the first few minutes of Morehouse's performance.
Just because I am unbiased in saying whatever it is that I am going to say does not mean that I don't come to the table with preconceived notions of how a band is going to perform (waiting for someone to jump at that one). As I was in the wings of the stadium, I remember an usher asking me if I was from Morehouse. I said "no." She said "ok, because they are performing right now. I replied "oh, that's ok" nonchalantly.
I was anything but nonchalant about Morehouse's performance. Even though I arrived late I was greatly pleased by what I did see.
Morehouse performed a show dedicated to EWF and P-Funk (Dance Routine).
Dance Girl Feature - "Africano" - EWF
What impressed me the most about Morehouse's performance was their power and intensity in playing. Although probably the smallest band there Morehouse was far from timid. They played with a level of ability and focus that would have made any small band director proud.
Great arrangement.
Show Song - "After The Love Is Gone"
Although Warren Shaw predicted exactly what the band was going to play here (which says something about creativity and originality) the performance of the song was still good.
Great solo saxophone player.
More to come...
Dance Routine
The run at the beginning of "Flashlight" was a little rough.
"Knee Deep" - P-Funk
There was at least one place here where the Mellophones were really off.
"Atomic Dog"
Watch the top note of each of those licks tubas!
Cool trombone chord stack during this.
"Jamaica Funk"
I don't think this is a P-Funk song but ok we'll go with it. A trumpet player came out to a mic to play a solo. Although not as effective as the sax solo before it was still pretty creative to have an instrumental solo during a dance routine.
The dance seemed to start to lose energy at the end of the show. This was solved however by Morehouse hitting a few solidly powerful notes at the very end to get people's attention again.
In Summary
Although Morehouse ranked relatively low in my rankings, that was mainly because I wasn't able to compare their drill to anyone else's. Even though there were better bands in attendance Morehouse did a great job. They have a made a fan out of me, and they may just be a band to lookout for in the future in the SIAC. Morehouse deserved to be there and I look forward to seeing them in the future.
The Prunester - "Telling It Like Is."
Next Up - UAPB
UAPB started with a very high energy show.
Young Drum Major – I initially made up in mind that I would ignore his performance. After all you can’t judge a college band performance off the abilities of an 8-9 year old. When he hit a backflip in place during the drum major entrance, it was kind of hard to ignore. Good choice here.
Percussion had some cleanliness issues while marching on the field.
Drill Song - “I Love Music” – The O’Jays.
The band transition to the Superman emblem with the “M4” (Marching Musical Machine of the Mid-South) and then UAPB.
Trumpets were a little flat at points.
Good overall sound (from what I could tell from behind).
Overall Marching
UAPB needs to work on their turns. Every time individual players make turns they lose their characteristic marching style for a few steps. This hurts the crispness of UAPBs drill formations.
Looking at the band from the front there were some major issues in the formations of the right side of the band.
Dance Girl Song – “To Be Real” – Cheryl Lynn
Tenor drums suddenly got way too loud. At another time in the song both the bass drum and tenor drums turned up the volume tremendously. This sounded much better than the tenor drums alone getting loud since dynamic level of the bass drums kept the percussion section in balance with itself.
More to come...
“The Dip”
Very high energy level but poor marching during the transition.
I applaud UAPB for keeping their intensity going throughout the dance routine. Great work!
UAPB formed two 2 stick figures on the field and made them dance against each other by doing certain moves in sequence throughout the band. Very creative.
Lol. UAPB pulled out Grambling’s signature dance towards the end of the dance. Not as hype as the rest of what they were doing.
After the dance, UAPB formed HBOB on the field of Honda Battle of the Bands (Spelled out for slow people like me) and the played “Back That Thang Up” by Juvenile. Excellent crowd response.
They then changed the formation into HBCU and marching off the field while presenting signs with the logos of each school in attendance. Very, very classy and it really worked well for the audience.
In Summary
The first 2 bands that performed at the event really did a great job of setting off the whole event. Neither Morehouse nor UAPB fell into the low energy dance routine trap that has foiled so many bands for so long.
UAPB truly gave the audience their money’s worth. Great playing, high energy and a lot of creativity added up a terrific performance.
The Prunester – "Telling It Like It Is." - Next Up - NCA&T
its Marching Musical Machine of the Mid-South....
The band started with an A&T Formation. I liked that the band started in the A&T formation and then moved from there instead of starting in something else and moving into formation.
Intro – “In The Air Tonight” – Phil Collins
Based on A&T’s track record I would have thought that this arrangement would have had more going on.
Lots of crooked Lines while marching on to the field.
I liked the formation made during this fanfare. Nonsymmetrical formations (not necessarily curvilinear) are well past due in Showstyle bands.
Lots of pretty cool tuba soli's here.
Drill - “Take Back The Night”
Good arrangement. The band was a little out of balance here. The trumpets had a hard time keeping up with A&T's powerful low brass section.
Although A&T is doing a great job of keeping of keeping the sound facing the front, they still need to work on keeping those lines straight and getting to formation on time. A tremendous amount of time needs to be spent on this. Although A&T is pushing the envelope it still needs to be right.
On the other hand. Let me say this. I generally do not alter my opinions based on later video review (I’m pretty thorough, so most of the time I don’t need to). However, one thing I did not notice before was A&T’s marching style. A&T was regularly received negative comments about their sometimes poor marching style. This seems to have change tremendously though. A&T must have spent an enormous amount of time perfecting this. There has been definite improvement here and the difference is noticeable.
Also although the transitions to formations were subpar at points the actual formations during this drill were often pretty good.
More to come...
The band made a larger A&T Formation here. Problems on the diagonals on this.
Problems with mellophone intonation at the end.
Slow Song - “Spend The Night” - The Isley Brothers
I really liked the balance here. The low brass really backed off so that the trumpets could shine through. Great work.
Something happened here in the mellophones that was not very nice at all.
Nice baritones.
I liked the fact that the band transitioned during the slow song instead of just staying in place during the whole song.
This song really kept A&T in the game. Until this point was A&T’s show was lackluster and quote far away from the type of show that could win the Honda.
Dance Girl Song – "Night of Your Life" - David Guetta featuring Jennifer Hudson
Great arrangement.
At the beginning of this selection a young lady was carried from the back of the field to the front and presented as a queen while Golden Delight danced in front of her.
Part of the way through the show, the queen walked to the middle of the field while one of the dancers moved behind her. When the queen suddenly moved back to her throne, the dance had changed outfits and now showed herself to be a majorette.
While the audience’s attention was distracted by this the whole section of Golden Delight dancers also did a uniform change right in the middle of the field. Wow!
In the meantime, the Queen held her leg up in the air in various positions.
More to come...
Great analysis, please keep it up.
North Myrtle Beach ਸਭ ਦੀ ਏਕਤਾ said:
Although the cleanliness of the playing was hard to tell due to the echo in the dome the fact the percussion section was featured really brought contrast to the show. Some of the snares played while being held upside down (it was the multi-toms last year. Next year, it will be the bass drums. Hey that would actually be really cool). Every section got a chance to do something. My only complaint was that the spacing of the feature this year made things a little cluttered sometimes. Make sure to keep a separation between the groups for visual clarity.
Transition Drill - "Night & Day: – Al B Sure
A&T must continue to work on their formations. Powerful tubas.
Dance routine. “Day n’ Night” – Kid Cudi Some Band members seemed unsure of moves.
Corpstyle Portion
A&T should absolutely be congratulated for their attempt at Corpstyle marching. Although not perfect they attempted a particularly difficult maneuver with the whole band rotation that was done. Please keep in mind that Drum & Bugle Corps work on things like this all year, not just for a few weeks with a winter break in the middle. This moment was absolutely the most exciting part of the whole day!
More to come...
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