NEWS OF OUR CORPS

2010 Cadets

Cadet News:

July 20, Van Buren, AK from RadioSteele DCP

The Cadets 88.80 - Impressive score? It could have been even better today. I watched them practice in Clarksville earlier in the afternoon and they were putting 90+ work on the field, by far one of the most efficient, respectful and professional drum corps rehearsals I have ever seen in my life. It's no wonder they are kicking butt this year. There was apparently a fall in tonight's show that I missed, and I don't know if that had an impact on the outcome. A bass drum was missing from the battery. They have done a bit more with Jeffery's character and it makes so much more sense now than in the beginning of the season. I just love the end when he earns "his stripes".

This corps is fast, loud, clean as a whistle and wildly entertaining. I think when the guard is just dancing in their full soldier uniforms at the beginning of the show, it may be leaving some judges at a loss when they follow corps like SCV, the Cavies and Phantom Regiment. The first half of the show, they may want to clear that up a bit and be more noticeable. Maybe same style of jackets, but a different color? Don't know. When a corps is this good and you have to look at a uniform choice has the only possible weak point - well you have a kick-butt drum corps. As they continue to clean, I feel they can still catch the Blue Devils later this season, but it will be a challenge. One of my favorite shows this year, without a doubt.

July 3 Michigan City, IN, by jehensley dcp

Cadets... Nice show... Very Un-Cadets... I loved it! Seemed like some odd moments of drill. That is... They play the character stuff really well, then go into some cool drill stuff, but minus the character touch. Maybe it's just me, but it felt kinda disjointed. Not to take away from what they are doing, cause it's cool, just an observation.

General score comparisons, July 6 (note: these scores are from various contests scattered across the country. They are not comparative scores of any validity)

by oldbandguy dcp

For the first time this season ALL 23 corps have competed. I believe 20 of them competed tonight. Big number put up by Cadets tonight. A little separation between
top 12 and #13...but it's only July 4. Anyone willing to take my bet that no corps goes undefeated in 2010?

Scores as of 7/4

1 The Cadets : 84.9
2 Carolina Crown : 83.5
3 Blue Devils : 83.3
4 Bluecoats : 83.2
5 Cavaliers : 83.0
6 Phantom Regiment : 81.9

7 Santa Clara Vanguard : 80.2
8 Boston Crusaders : 79.9
9 Blue Knights : 78.9
10 Blue Stars : 78.2
11 Glassmen : 77.4
12 Madison Scouts : 76.7

13 Troopers : 73.7
14 The Colts : 72.7
15 Academy : 72.6
16 Spirit : 71.8
17 Crossmen : 71.6

18 Pacific Crest : 70.0
19 Teal Sound : 69.6
20 Jersey Surf : 68.6
21 Cascades : 67.2
22 Mandarins : 66.9
23 Pioneer : 65.4

Michigan City, IN July 3 from general taos chicken 2 DCP

Cadets: woo hoo!!! loved this show. strong guard, strong drums with an epic feature, pretty good hornline, good design and a lot of potential/opportunity. this is the corps I'm routing for for '10 champions. I'm not predicting they'll get it, I just think they deserve it, and have a great show.

Michigan City, IN July 3 from Bob984 DCP (viewed on fan network)

Cadets...........since the start of the season, the most improved corps in the country. this show has it all....solid arrangements with continuity and impact, plenty of demand, a deadly drumline, and no real weakness. They are also really starting to sell this product. The improvement in the last week was significant, and the score was totally earned. If they keep up this intensity, they may be the corps to beat, and may not drop another show this year..........

Michigan City, IN July 3 from general taos chicken 2 DCP

Cadets: woo hoo!!! loved this show. strong guard, strong drums with an epic feature, pretty good hornline, good design and a lot of potential/opportunity. this is the corps I'm routing for for '10 champions. I'm not predicting they'll get it, I just think they deserve it, and have a great show.

Michigan City, IN July 3 from Bob984 DCP (viewed on fan network)

Cadets...........since the start of the season, the most improved corps in the country. this show has it all....solid arrangements with continuity and impact, plenty of demand, a deadly drumline, and no real weakness. They are also really starting to sell this product. The improvement in the last week was significant, and the score was totally earned. If they keep up this intensity, they may be the corps to beat, and may not drop another show this year..........

July 2 Cedarburg WI by Jim Anello JCP

No need to worry about the "trip" in Cadets' show. There's so many layers of complexity that something like that is easily missed. As much as I don't care for George's vision for DCI, those kids march and play the heck out of their show. Among the many impressive things that stick in my head, the extended unison solo with the snares and quads really jumps out at me. Clean, clean clean!!

July 2 Cedarburg WI by rkfdPRhan DCP

Cadets play recorded symphony music and little Jeffrey leads them in
march hop skip and 21 herald horns.
Very clean marching.
Guard dressed like corps. It's confusing!
Nice flag work.
Clear horns not loud but solid.
Jeffrey decks the guard and picks him up.
Guard member teaches him rifle work.
Guard removes jacket showing bright pink tshirts.
Great flag work.
Good drum solo.
Now horns get loud but clear.
Spaces in line work.
Soprano horn trips ( lead horn ) recovers and doesn't mess things up to bad
nice horn licks.
Drums warming up no wait they are smokin' too.
Long drum solo!
Hats placed on ground.
Great marching around them!
Hats back on for last set.
Nice lines
sound
drums
sections sound crisp
good tuba sound
love the last flag sequence!!!!
No surprises tonight.
Crowd loved them everyone on feet!!!

July 2 Cedarburg, WI by Galen DCP

Last up: The Cadets. Tonight was a night when this show started to really click with me. The opening production kinda feels like a show all by itself. Result is you're really stoked after seeing and hearing it, but are kinda left thinking, "Ok, they've still got 6 minutes to go. What else are they gonna do?" Fortunately the rest of the show is starting to come together. Middle piece kinda seems like it'll take the most time to come together and get lined up with the rest of the program. But Cadets were certainly in a class by themselves tonight.

6/18 Allentown, PA from Bob984 DCP

Cadets.........Procession of the Nobles was a very strong opener, complete with heralds, and a left corner brass entrance. The corps carries the "toy soldier" theme very well, and I think it will appeal to the masses. Nobles ends with huge impact but into a sudden "toy collapse/wind-down".....I almost wish they would have blown the roof off and resolved the ending a bit more, and then collapsed, and felt that both times. The 2nd piece is fast and furious. They struggled with tempo/stamina in some sections, but it will come with reps. My biggest concern is in Dance of the Tumblers. It's a great piece of music, but I think that the arrangement strays from the original a bit too much. They even added what has now become a "cliche" brass run where the entire brass line plays an extended running 16th passage. I don't think they will get the necessary mileage out of that, and it might be better to simply incorporate the original moving passages of the piece, as there are plenty of them. They also struggled with some of the harder runs (again, 6/18), especially bari/mello. Trumpets were very close, though, and have some huge articulation demands which I think will be great in August. Guard is in the regular corps uniform for a good portion of the show. It takes awhile to get used to. I understand the concept, but it might be cool if they would be in actual "toy soldier" uniforms for the 1st part. The guard is strong with mucho equipment work, and they will be fine in that caption. Percussion is definitely very well prepared, and the writing fits well. I thought that the Cadets had the best full ensemble cohesion/tempo control of the night, especially the 1st run. The battery has a feature which will get the audience every time....snares have an incredible high speed single/double sticking combination pattern which goes on forever, yet they hold it, and then break into a super speed double stroke roll....tenors and bass are quite strong, too. Pit is competent. No recap has been posted, but I would venture to guess that they may have won percussion both times, as they were noticeably cleaner overall than Cavs/Crown. I thought that perc. and effect might put them in a little closer to Crown. Show was not done yet, so I will be curious what remains, but they have much potential.

6/18 Allentown, PA by Tommeee DCP

CADETS - (first impression) Very many exposed parts musically. Much room for improvement. Really really really cool percussion feature. Aside from that, there were some places where I wanted to stand up and yell, but impact of some of those points seems to not be connecting with the audience at times. But it is close.

(full review) Again, I've seen and heard this music a lot from their All Access website, so I thought I knew what was coming. But really, watching online does not do this justice. (of course, there is never anything like a LIVE performance) Their opener getting cleaner, but now it needs to have more points of impact. The effect is not there yet. In fact, there are several opportunities for better impact from an effect standpoint. I think this show has a chance to be very memorable, a la 2000. In fact, it reminds me of that show a lot, for some reason. It has more room to grow, for sure. Many dirty brass parts. Many dirty drill sections - in fact, at times it is difficult to tell what they are trying to do. But yet the programming itself is very enjoyable and entertaining. And speaking of entertaining, the field percussion section is VERY entertaining - especially the feature which is old school in a very cool way. The guard is good, and I love the fact that they are wearing the regular Cadet uniform in the beginning. It really portrays the "Toy SOULdier" concept very well. In fact, I think their show concept was much easier to grab onto than either Cavies or Crown. From this respect, they are ahead of the game. Best overall concept from them in years. And there are many more individual leg/body/arm/head movements from the members than they have had before. It is cool to see, but again, it means they are very dirty at this early point in the season. It was generally my favorite show of the evening, but I pretty much knew Crown had the better performance. The performance captions, in my opinion, are going to have an effect on the effect captions for quite a while for The Cadets.

I predicted Crown with 75.0, Cadets with a 74.9, and Cavaliers with a 72.0.

6/26 Middleton, WI from Madalumni DCP

Next up were the Cadets. Similar to the Cavaliers, they really grab you from the start. The Corps proper and most
of the color guard is positioned toward the back left of the field in a tight block. There is a lone guard member dressed
like a young boy in overalls and a blue and white striped shirt. He runs around, and in and out of the Corps - playing with
them as if they were his "Toy Soldiers". This is the pre-show and after the official announcement, the hornline comes
in strong with "Procession of the Nobles". What a wonderful piece and it really takes us back to some of the "Old School"
shows of the 80s. The Cadets could easily win the title with this show. It has all the right design elements, all the right
melodic content and complexity, and it just flows seemlessly from beginning to end. One of my favorite parts is an
extended snare/tenor feature with rifles flying everywhere behind them. Just wonderful, pure excitment. My only criticism
of the show is that all the silks are in the very warm range of the color palet. Alot of golds, yellows, oranges and pinks.
I would prefer a splash of blues or purples here and there, but that is again a personal preference. It was interesting to
see Mr. Hopkins on the front sideline. He paces back and forth through the entire show. I wonder if he always does that.
It seems like he was concentrating real hard on every little portion of the show. Maybe that's how he gets them
at such a high level. Overall this show was the complete package of the night and they will only get better from here.

6/26 Middleton, WI from ScribeToo DCP

I'd like to say the Cadets coming onto the field did not generate any kind of negative furor as I was lead to believe would happen as a result of the recent.. um.. rules developments.. and I'm really glad. I was able to just enjoy the show -- led off by a relative local "drum major Jeffy" -- and enjoy it I did. This is going to be a very popular program. Not only is it a buoyant, gleeful performance, they already have sections of blistering brass and percussion features which are, admittedly, dirty as bare feet in flip flops on a dirt road... right now. They're going to get better. a LOT better... but I will say (and I told a few of their staff and volunteers I talked to on the way out of the stadium) in all honesty, this is one of my favorite Cadets shows in recent history. The way I feel watching it brings me back to the days when I wanted more than anything to be a Garfield Cadet.

6/21 Charleston, WV Elmo Blatch DCP

Cadets--Visually a very, very dirty show for Cadets, however, best interactive show of the night. High demand visually and musically--very hard hornline book and performed very well. Toy Souldier is a great concept conveyed very well. Drumline played a mezzo piano section--which was simply amazing--best drum feature of the night. This group has to find a way to get the guard totally out of the corps proper uniform...while it looks great and fits the theme, when they are doing work (especially with the hats and plumes with the striped pants) this is a great distraction visually--too many mistakes show up WAY too easily. Visually, the corps is typical Cadets at lightning speed and doing a great job. They have the vehicle to contend and the demand is definitely there--whether they can clean this monster by Finals is another thing, but it is possible.