From: splooie@camelot.bradley.edu (Romeo Casiple)
Subject: Re: Creativity vs. Execution
Organization: Bradley University
Distribution: na
Date: 26 Sep 92 21:20:53 GMT

In <1992Sep25.160958.19681@medtron.medtronic.com> ck10322@china.medtronic.com (Cameron Kaszas) writes:

>3. I think that the thing that has made the biggest 
>   impact on performance levels of today is better corps
>   staffs.  There is much more thought put into the show, and
>   there is much more KNOWLEDGE of how to accomplish what has 
>   been designed.  Just an example from my experience - 
>   I love talking about my marching days :)  :)  :)
>   My corps placed 6rd in 1980 (Trivia Question: who was it?), 
>   and one of our drill moves was a circle that rotated about 
>   a point on its circumference while being translated 
>   (X moved linearly in the diagram below). 

>       o   o
>    o         o
>     
>   o           o 
>   
>    o         o                    o   o
>       o   X   - - - - - - - >  X         o
>                       
>                               o           o
>            
>                                o         o
>                                   o   o

>   Boy, did we have to work on that, because our instructors 
>   didn't have a clue how to teach it.  We got it only 
>   by doing it over and over until they told us it looked 
>   right, and then we had to try to remember what we did.  Today,
>   this is a simple thing, and could probably be taught easily.  

Speaking as a current MM, I really appreciate what we have to work with
today, with regard to drill design & the effeciency that the drill is 
taught!  

I guess that it isn't any surprise to anyone that drill today is designed
and taught by a coordinate system.. well, at least that's how we do it
anyway.  It might be a little different with other corps and other   
designers, but probably more or less the same.  Each form or change of
direction is written on paper as a "set", and each person is given a
coordinate of where he needs to be on a particular count in the music.
The coordinate is given in a short but understandable code.. e.g.
4 1/2 BFSL, 3 3/4 inside 45 S2 would mean that particular set is 4 and
1/2 steps behind the front side line, and 3 3/4 steps inside the 45
yard line on side 2 of the field.  That might be set 1, and to get to 
set 2 may require 8 counts.  After hitting that set the next set may 
take 12 counts to get there, etc. etc.  It is like connecting the dots,
moving from set to set in a straight path and a different step size
to get to each, depending on the number of counts to get there.

I really haven't given much thought to how effecient this system really
is, until I read that little clip about early 80's drill design.  What
kind of nightmare would it be having to design drill and teach it 
without using the coordinate system??  I couldn't even picture learning
drill without it.

My question is, for FMM's out there:  how exactly did you learn drill
& how was it cleaned?  My question for current MM's is: do your corps
learn drill in a similar way that I have just described?  Just by    
watching Star and Cadets, I might imagine that the drill is taught a
little differently, because corps members do not ALWAYS take a straight
path to get to their sets.  It would be interesting to know how they
do things different..

SPLOOIE
splooie@camelot.bradley.edu