And now a little blog which I have posted before about the judging system and the marching activity. You have to go into this activity knowing what to expect. If we win great, if we don’t then maybe next year. People who live in a sports world may have a hard time with this system. In the “Cutting Edge,” a movie about a professional hockey player who loses his peripheral vision and joins forces with a famous ice skater, joining the ranks of the olympics, it is very obvious the differences when the judges make “all the calls.” The prior hockey player has trouble comprehending his new medium. The following paragraphs are to let you know what we as the marching staff deal with, live with, and try to conquer the best we can in our “quest to be the best.” I will update you after each show on our inner workings, what we are doing, and what our goals are through this blog.
Marching band judges each have a caption, which I listed in the prior blog post on September 3rd. The judges are supposed to judge their caption without going "out of caption." They don't do this which is obvious by the fact that they almost always rank all the bands in the same exact order across all captions. This defies reason, each band is strong in different areas and realistically, each judged caption should have the bands in a different order. Now check out this scenario, hope I don’t lose you. Sometimes the visual judges only judge the guard without even looking at the band marching style, forms, posture, etc. This puts a band that marches a difficult show well at a disadvantage because they get no credit for their work. Sometimes the music judges also decide to judge the visual, which diminishes a band's music score since it isn't being judged. When a music judge does this and is not impressed with the visual aspect, a band in essence is "penalized" twice for the visual portion of the show. Actually, the band is penalized a third time since there is no credit given from that judge for the music they are doing. As staff members we try to be subjective, but still are scratching our heads as we leave some of the contests because the numbers don't even seem to line up with the taped critiques. Oh yes, each judge makes a tape critiquing the band. We get these tapes immediately after we perform and go to the staff room to listen to the tapes and prepare for the post contest judges meeting, where we get 5 minutes with each judging group (visual and music) to get an in person evaluation from the judges.
You need to know, when you get involved in this activity, that it is a "subjective judging" environment. I probably should repeat that last sentence a hundred times! These scores are entirely determined by the judges' evaluations using the judges sheets. The judges decide absolutely everything. It is very much like figure skating or judged olympic events. They make the call for everything. One or two judges can bury you, giving you a score so low that it moves you out of contention for winning a contest. This has happened to us at all the contests last year. We may not agree with the judges, but complaining will not solve anything since we realize that this is a "subjective" environment. It comes with the territory. Those same judges could have had us up by points, giving us a large lead over all the other bands.
Sometimes the judges don’t give you credit for something amazing. For instance, at the dome last year not one of the 12 judges (double slate at the dome) said one word during our drum feature, they were silent. It was probably one of the high points in the entire dome, the drum conveyor belt and the band doing the walk through box. National Class Bands did not even attempt what we mastered. Just look at our youtube site. But the judges, not one word!!!! Can’t complain, nowhere to complain to, we’ll just get them mad. We work the judges as best we can and chip away at them, selling our program in those post contest meetings and wherever else we can. Remember, patience, patience, patience. The wins will come, I went through this with Mineola (I taught there for 11 years) in our climb from last to 1st on the island. Mineola had the high long island scores in 1997 and 1998, over everyone. It took quite a bit of patience, wow! Many rough show scores in that climb, the same thing we are going through right now.
Then you have a situation like last year at the dome, when 6 of the 7 bands in our class were constantly moving, one band sat down on park benches for one third of their show. They tied for 1st place! Every student who plays an instrument sits down their whole first 5 or 6 years, the easiest way to play an instrument. The judges chose them and put them in 1st despite the fact that they sat playing. Some bands cut the band down to their top players, having auditions and being more selective. They win with 40 or 50 total in their band. Here at Roslyn we want as many kids involved as possible so we don’t cut it down to the best, most experienced players. Touching lives is why we are here! This is why some conferences give you higher scores if you are a larger band, and put the bands in size order, total number of band members or musicians.
What the audience usually responds to is "general effect". It only accounts for about 40% of the score and that is why people don't always agree with the judges' results.
Many marching band people say that the only way you can tell who is the best is to wait until the dome. That is where all the bands in the class perform at the same time, for the same judges, in the same environment. At the dome the judging slates are doubled, so the scores are derived from 12 judges. Anything can happen at championships.
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