winter 2014
f ocus
news of
Hall of fame judge GeorGe oliviero
Onthe Fast Track George Mason
Say What?
Winter Guard and percussion linGo explained
University
”
rhapSody
Soul MateS find true love
A clinic in consistency www.wgi.org
wgi focus 1
“
inside
f ocus Winter 2014 Volume 27, Issue 1
Winter Guard International Ron nankeRvIs Executive Director BaRt Woodley Director of Operations aaRon JenkIns Marketing & Communications Manager Published By: In tune Partners, llC IRWIn koRnfeld CEO WIll edWaRds President emIle menasChé Editor-in-Chief JaCkIe JoRdan Creative Director RoBIn GaRBeR Production Director BaRBaRa BouGhton Business Manager ContRIButInG WRIteRs: Debbie Galante Block, Michael Boo, Jon Chappell, Danny Miles, Michael Reed, Daniel Schack PhotoGRaPhy: Adam Alonzo, Johnny Gilbert, Jolesch Photography, Ken McGrath,
WGI FOCUS is an educational publication of WGI Sport of the Arts. It is digitally published three times per year, Fall, Winter, and Spring. The Spring issues is also printed and has a circulation of 16,000 copies. To subscribe, visit wgi.org/focus For advertising information or to submit an article for consideration, please contact Aaron Jenkins; phone: 937-247-5919 x310 email: aaron@wgi.org WInteR GuaRd InteRnatIonal 2405 Crosspointe Drive Dayton, OH 45342 937-247-5919
7 ensemble
Ramping up for the 2014 season ... New Hall of Fame inductees Tom Aungst, Julie Davila, and Jim Dwyer ... Keep up with all the 2014 championship drama via social media... WGI at Midwest Band ... plus old school imagery, new
14 Close-uP
In a few short years, George
16 PRofIle
Hall of Fame judge and educator George Oliviero has been involved with WGI since the beginning.
20 WInnInG heaRts
Winter guard brought Rhapsody “SoulMates” together and helped nurture a true-life romance for Amy and Adam Hancock.
28 ClInIC
25 WGI slanGuaGe “throwing babies,” or gobsmacked by “gakada-
programs share the strategies that have helped them make their groups consistent contenders.
30 sCholaRshIP
Rising through the ranks to Byron Phung says he learned both musical and character lessons that will last a lifetime.
34 What’s youR WGIQ? yourself in this photo comparison.
30 www.wgi.org
WIth total foCus on heR PeRfoRmanCe, thIs GuaRd memBeR Is Really “lIvInG.”
line has developed into a force to be reckoned with.
Features
and percussion lingo is here to help.
25
sCholaRshIP WInneR ByRon PhunG PeRfoRms WIth ayala.
wgi focus 5
e n s emb l e
news from the floor and more
The year has turned and the short winter days are getting longer, which can only mean one thing: The 2014Sport of the Arts season is set to begin. And as always, there will be plenty of excitement around the country as WGI color guards and percussion ensembles make their way to April’s World Championships in Dayton. The action gets underway on February
The 2014 COLOR GUARD
ter, NY; and Salem, MA) and one percus-
PERCUSSION
ahead of regional championships 3
15-16) and East, Southeast, and the Color Guard World Champion-
"Day After” clinic for color guard members. The 2014 guest clinician had yet to be announced as we went to press, but past leaders and three percussion groups from Thailand will come to Dayton for the
Mia Michaels and Sonya Tayeh. The percussion schedule is no less intense. Early season high-
ensembles to compete. “This is an exciting time of interna-
on April 10-12.
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more countries are creating competing color guards and indoor percussion ensembles, they are also starting to desire to come participate at the World Championships. We truly are putting the ‘I’ in WGI.”
“This is an exciting time of international growth for WGI...”
i
# HasHtag—You’re It.
twitter.com/WGItweets
www.wgi.org
wgi focus 7
e n s emb l e
guard Focus last thing you want to do is waste it by searching through your music. Touch app by Sung heroes is designed to make dance and guard rehearsals more songs from an iTunes library—as
ThE MIDWAY As it has for the last dozen years, WGI hit the road in December to attend the Mid-
known simply as “Midwest Clinic.” ensembles, clinicians, and the musical instrument industry, it’s a time to see old friends and make new ones. “WGI is always hoping to engage music professionals who are unfamiliar with the indoor marching arts,” says Marketing and Communications Manager Aaron Jenkins. “As they walk by the booth,
email and external sources—and control their tempo using a simple set of controls while the audio is rable tempos can be stored for instant recall. In addition, the app sections of the music and mark be operated using wireless controllers. sungheroes.com/stepintime.
Percussion Focus When it comes to perfect timing, it
and instructors who already teach and direct a color guard or percussion ensemble.”
perfectly balanced. Traditionally,
ed in starting ensembles back home. “It was amazing the amount of directors who mentioned they were starting new groups this season,” Jenkins says. “It explains why
designed to make the process easie by categorizing sticks by the kind of
VINtage 1997
Spinfest & Drumfest Asia, which is happening in Tokyo on May 10-11. Finally, the Midwest Clinic is always a great time to meet up with our sponsors. Their dedication to the music industry as well as the marching arts is simply amazing.”
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rebound. The concept came about after the designers ranked the factors they considered to be most important when choosing sticks. They concluded that, after diameter, balance was the key. The forward balance sticks
drummers.” Currently, all Select additional models are expected soon. ProMark.com.
www.wgi.org
e n s emb l e spoTligHT By Michael Boo
Tom AungsT
Julie DAvilA
Jim Dwyer
tions, and is a clinician and endorsee for Pearl
Tom AungsT has turned the world of marching percussion upside-down, both indoors and
percussion) and Evans (drumheads). Percussion trophies, including most recently the -
Jim Dwyer WGI Indoor Marching Percussion and has served on
larity of the activity with innovative and creative shows that elevated the art of storytelling along
sion activities for the past three decades through-
lessly shares his educational ideas with others through numerous clinics each year, appearing under the auspices of Yamaha (drums), Vic Firth
-
Percussion Ensemble,” has become a standard educational resource for drum line instructors Hall of Fame in 2006. Julie DAvilA has helped many groups excel in WGI
activity. Her groups have earned seven medals spanning four WGI scholastic divisions, winning the served on the percussion advisory board for over two decades and is presently on the steering
chamber percussion ensemble (winner of a 2011 Drum magazine), and is an
published over 25 marching and concert composi10 wgi focus
Formal Hall of Fame inductions place in
and has dedicated much of his energy to promoting
percussionists develop—which go way beyond touched the lives of wide number of aspiring WGI
variety of show designers as they discussed how to storyboard a show, create visual concepts, stage their productions, organize their front ensembles, and create props and other visual elements that lift a percussion production above the ordinary.
Fame Foundations Founded in 1992, the wgi The Hall of Fame is the highest honor presented to individuals who have had a major impact the activity’s history and members through their contributions as leaders, designers, educators, judges, and more. inductees alternate annually between color guard (odd numbered years) and percussion (even numbered years). read more at wgi.org/contents/Hall-of-Fame.html.
www.wgi.org
i
Over the past several years, participation in WGI Indoor Winter Percussion events has increased exponentially in both the number of units and the number of fans tions. Much of the growing popularity of these events is due to the three leaders and innovators who are being honored this year with induction into the WGI Hall of Fame.
close-up
Growing a Green Machine George Mason University’s Indoor Percussion Line Is on the Rise By Dan Schack
sense of maturity and completeness. GMU posted an impressive 92.250 at last season’s
“The dedication and commitment from a strong group of veteran members have been a fantastic the group.”
George Mason University’s (GMU) Mean Green indoor percussion ensemble has quickly become a force to be reckoned with. Since its inaugural year, in 2009, the group made consistent improvement while fortifying its and instructors. After winning Independent Open Class (PIO) in its third season with the forward-thinking production “Go,” GMU made the jump to the über-competitve Independent World Class (PIW) in 2013. “The dedication and commitment from a strong group of veteran GMU,” says Chris Martin, Mean Green’s director and founder. “The Open Class championship was very special for our members.” With battery and visual designer Mike Jackson and front ensemble and sound designer Kevin Shah coming onboard in 2013, group’s show “All That I Believe.” showed a new
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much more experience in PIW competition. “Mike and Kevin do a fantastic job of creating powerful productions that make students and teachers alike want to be a part of George Mason,” says Chris Garay, GMU’s ensemble coordinator (as well as part time snare tech and truck driver). The rest of the marching percussion community is taking notice. “We have students in both the front ensemble and the battery marching with top-12 DCI groups in the summer,” adds Garay, who says that the climb up the competitive ladder is proving to be a powerful recruiting tool. Success in competition has also helped Mean Green win fans in George Mason’s administration and student body. “The amount of logistical support from the university has increased,” Martin says. “So has our visibility on campus with the addition of a curricular drumline class.” Introducing a drumline class to the university’s curriculum has been important for the growth of the program for several reasons: it allows veterans to keep playing throughout the taste of what it’s like to march in a competitive fundamentals and build the technique necessary to produce quality performances. Perhaps most important, it recognizes the work the years. It is a sign that the George Mason administration understands that the lessons providimportant academic goals within a challenging university setting. Despite its success both in the arena and the future, setting even loftier goals in 2014 and beyond. “The standards are higher than ever, ” Garay concludes. “We weigh George Mason against other perennial WGI World Class
www.wgi.org
A Judge For All Time By Debbie Galante Block
Color Guard Judge
George Oliviero heads the math department at James Logan High School in Union, California. But when not in the classroom, he’s most at home with a score sheet in his hands as a WGI judge. After marching with Esso from 1958-’61, Oliviero taught with some of the Boston area’s top drum corps before becoming a judge. Part of WGI since the organization’s founding (and a WGI judge since 1978), he remains at the forefront of education in the marching arts. We caugt up with the WGI and Drum Corps International hall of famer as the 2014 season was getting underway. When I was young, there were Sunday afternoon color guard contests. My friends from the Everett (Mass.) drum corps wanted to go watch. There was no recorded music, but a few Everett drummers were there, playing “street beats” endlessly. Nobody tossed, twirled, spun, danced, or acted. It was purely military style with strict adherence to military manuals for the code of dealing with weapons and the American
eventually took over. The Crusaders were challenging because they were one of the best of the era—we missed a national title by the smallest of margins one year. When Ike asked if I would consider working with him at 27th Lancers, I agreed because he was a great friend and I admired his work as an instructor and judge. It turned out to be two very happy years for me of good competition, good camaraderie,
In 1978, I was president of the local judges association in Massachusetts. There was no organized way for the color guards to “do their thing.” So, when WGI was starting up, we got behind it right away. WGI brought all the color
There were hundreds of folks our age from all the local drum corps.
“The Lancers were a for me and I had two years of good competition, good camaraderie, 16 wgi focus
That came about as a bit of a coincidence. An instructor was ill and I was asked to help. From there, the junior corps needed an instructor and I stepped in. Then a good friend had to go away to school and I helped his color guard prepare for the championship. Then I learned that St. Anthony’s of Revere needed help for a bit, followed by the Immaculate Conception Reveries. My good friend, Ike Iannessa, was unable to complete the summer and George What a wonderful experience! From there, the Boston Crusaders asked me to help their instructor, who worked in western Massachusetts and couldn’t always be at rehearsals. I
guards together without depending on local associations and old-boy networks. By 1980, I began judging for WGI and have done so ever since. It has been a privilege.
All in all, I have spent my working career in the classroom, attempting to help students make sense of trigonometry, statistics, geometry, and algebra. Today, I am chairman of the math department. And while I love classroom teaching, WGI is always with me. Many of those who marched long ago are still teaching and judging today. It is exciting to me to judge next to someone who was once in a unit I taught. Most of all, I love watching the kids perform! www.wgi.org
winning
HeArts How a shared love of winter guard blossomed into a real life romance for two Rhapsody ”SoulMates’’ By Michael Reed
As the Holiday season passes, our focus turns to another, more romantic time—a season of love. While WGI cannot send each of our readers decorative cards, boxes of chocolate delights, or a dozen red roses, we can share with you a heart-warming tale of two young people with a shared love of winter guard, which grew into a deep love for each other. This story is our Valentine’s Day gift to you, the members, instructors, and fans of WGI. Adam Hancock and Amy Sciuto hail from Spokane, Washington. Both attended Mead High School. Amy had lived in Anchorage, Alaska, moved to the Evergreen State in 2002, and joined the Mead color guard for the 2003 marching band season. Adam played trumpet and became section leader in his senior season. Amy excelled in the guard and was named color guard captain. 20 wgi focus
“We were in a lot of the same classes, but we didn’t really know each other until later,” Adam recalls. “In fact, even after being in the marching band and AP Physics together for a couple of months, I wasn’t 100 percent sure what her name was when I asked her for help on a physics lab.”
The pair even won awards at the end of the season for being “most likely to be holding the girl on the DVD cover.” www.wgi.org
In the winter of 2005, Mead began a winter guard program, and the band director tried to recruit as many Adam was eager to join. Amy was too, but she couldn’t—she already had other commitments . (She was an athlete who competed on the varsity gymnastics team, and an artist who danced with Mead’s nationally competitive dance team.) In retrospect, the two activities were a perfect training ground for her later success in the WGI arena. her that season. There simply was not time to add winter guard to an already full plate. Amy was dedicated to the color guard program and was sad that she was missing this opportunity to perform again.
www.wgi.org
that Amy was pretty bummed out and gave her a big hug and told her to hang in there. They started dating a few months later, in March of 2005, in the middle of winter guard competition season. The couple stayed together after graduation, though it was a long-distance relationship. That summer, Adam continued his performance career as he joined the Seattle cascades Drum and Bugle corps and toured the country. That fall, he enrolled at Whitworth University in Spokane with a double major in music education and performance. Amy, on the other hand, headed to the other end of the state, enrolling at the University of Washington in Seattle, almost 300 miles away. Amy came home for the holidays and Adam drove to wgi focus 21
Seattle as much as possible, but they did not get see each other very often during those college years. Summers were problematic because Adam marched with the cascades once again in 2006 and then spent the following two summers with the concord california-based Blue Devils, winning the 2007 DcI championship in Pasadena. It was around this time that cascades Director Jimmy Fursman started couple of years were spent honing their skills in the Independent A division. As the ensemble matured and moved into the Independent Open division in 2008, Amy made the decision to join the cast. Adam joined her for the following season. That winter saw many long car rides from one end of the state to the other for Adam. As the couple recalls, during the try and Adam was wrapping up his senior year and student teaching in Spokane. Every Friday after his last band mountains to Seattle—sometimes in several inches of snow—for Rhapsody rehearsal. After rehearsal on Sunday, they would grab dinner and maybe a quick nap before classes back in Spokane. Rhapsody’s production that year was titled “SoulMates.”“The concept was drawn from Plato’s Symposium, which describes humans being split in half by Zeus, and the constant search for your other half,” Adam explains. “Every performer had a partner who they began and ended the show with. As you might expect, we were soul mates, and were featured, center stage, at the beginning and ending of the show.” Amy and Adam’s true love and talent helped win Rhapsody the top prize that year. “Winning the gold medal with such a tight group of close friends was exhilarating,” Adam recalls. “Sharing it with Amy was indescribable. We were together with each other and with our closest friends and it felt like it could not have gone any other way.” The other Rhapsody members had a bit of fun with Adam and Amy’s relationship. During that season, there was much lighthearted banter about a photo of their partner lift becoming the cover photo for the DVD. The pair even won awards at the end of the season for being “most likely to be holding the girl on the DVD cover.” little did they know that these words said in jest would turn out to be true. Adam explains, “We were very surprised and excited when we found out that we were in fact on the DVD.” But our story did not end there. Adam proposed in 22 wgi focus
“Every performer had a partner who they began and ended the show with. As you might expect, we were ‘soul mates’ and were featured center-stage at the beginning and ending of the show. the summer of 2011. Amy said yes. (This wouldn’t be much of a love story if she had ”SoulMateS” said anything else, would it?) After almost a duRing tHe year to prepare for the big day, they became 2009 SeaSon husband and wife the following June in their hometown of Spokane. What is a wedding without friends? They had plenty, as many fellow cast members and instructors from their gold medal-winning “SoulMates” production were on hand to witness the joyous occasion. The newlyweds settled in Spokane, and are currently high school teachers. Adam is a band director and Amy teaches math at her alma mater. They haven’t forgotten the role that winter guard has played in their lives, and are dedicated to fostering its growth. “We are looking forward to building a bigger color guard community here in Eastern Washington and passing on the many gifts that color guard has given us,” Amy says. “ If there is a future generation of Hancocks on the horizon, we can be sure that if the day comes when he or she
are more than capable of taking it from there.” aMy and adaM wed in June of 2012
www.wgi.org
Slanguage Winter guard members and percussionists speak a language all their own.
By Michael Boo
Bap it
he worlds of WGI winter guard and indoor percussion are unique microcosms of our larger society. And like members of other subcultures, performers
guard, stranger
uninitiated, WGI lingo can seem like a secret code. But whether you think of it as “slang,” “jargon,” or simply “our unique way of saying a few things,” it has a special meaning
the case of “get it”
happened. For
“Get it!” is performers to
guard: At least most of their signature terms sound like
-
Living You got it get it! maxed out fuLL-out feLicia
throw BaBies
performer makes an error, encouraging them to quickly
A member who frequently hears “you got it” may be one of the few terms with a traceable origin: In winter
not the term has its origins in the bap, a soft bread roll popularized in Scotland, is undetermined, but in winter www.wgi.org
mance, the tabulator deducted a 10th of a point for each tick
wgi focus 25
holy cheese!
When guard members get totally en-
Drummers have a seemingly endless variety of rhythmic patterns for which they have an equally seemingly endless number of names. in the old days, before automobile seat belts, Dr. Who, we had the list of 13 essential Rudiments, extracted from the 26 standard american Drum Rudiments. These were presented by N.a.R.D., the National association of Rudimental Drummers, an organization founded in 1933. in the 1980s, Pas, the Percussive arts society, expanded the list to the 40
something that just happens and has to be appreciated in the moment. When one is
tion. In some guards, a person who always
-
tape,” snatching their sabre on the marked spot. When a performer spins their equipment in one plane from end zone to end zone, they are “in the toaster.” Push to the front or the back, and
pzzzzt-ka-BLLrrah-BLLrrahka-Bum-de-um-skank-ka
wants the audience to
cheese
fuzzing Boom-crash
hacking gackada Juckada duh
performance that they throw their arms up in the air and the baby goes for a ride. Hopefully, that parent will “bap it” and the baby will be none the worse for wear. Compared to guard talk, “drumspeak” sounds like a really quite simple and has its basis in the sounds drums make when marching percussionists are doing their thing.
what “boom-cack” means. And to a drummer, “Pzzzzt-ka-bllrrah-bllrrah-ka-bum-de-um-skank-ka” makes perfect sense. But if you listen to drumnot allowed to play on their
such drumspeak patterns. marched with Carolina Crown
use of English words, too. One of Nichpercussion slang which refers to when drum lines practice marching and playing simultaneously on a running track or parade ground. One thing want to create is
when someone in the line is not in perfect sync
just not totally locked in. So
little fuzz in the performance.
standard snare Drum Rudiments. Today’s drummers have vastly expanded that list, and you’d be forgiven for thinking that they ‘re either making up rudimental terms on the spot or that the new rudiments were named at selection of “cheeses,” which refer the head a millisecond before the other) are “diddled,” doubling the single stroke, usually as a bounce. cheeses are hybrid rudiments that mate multiple rudiments to create something new, like combining marshmallows and graham crackers to make s‘mores. We’ve got “alternated cheese
cheese,” and “cheesed deviled eggs,” among a list far too numerous to fully mention. other hybrid rudiments with creative names include “eggbeaters,” “backwards eggbeaters,” “double say fast ten times in a row),
-
by “hacking” in the parking lot before a when the battery
and literally hundreds of others. By the time you read this, a few dozen new hybrid rudiments will likely have been created. it’s like keep up with them.
drummers; snare, tenors, brains prior to the massed warmup. In some regions, this is
mid-1990s and has taught percus-
author appears to have fainted.
26 wgi focus
Editor’s note:
hitting concert bass drums and suspended cymbals at the same time and with authority. In the end, the meaning of “guardese” and “drumspeak” really comes to light when you watch WGI groups in action. they can be. In a phrase, they get it. www.wgi.org
clinic
The Keys to Consistency Instructors from three of WGI’s most successful organizations explain the elements that keep their groups near the top year after year. By Michael Boo
and cleaning equipment phrases, allowing us to use our after-school gym time for putting together the show.
They say that great champions are measured by their ability to compete for the title on a regular basis. Why do some organizations meet the challenge year after year? We asked three instructors who have achieved consistency with their ensembles: Jaycee Wilson of Imbue Winter Guard, Dean Broadbent of Flanagan HS Winter Guard, and Rob Ferguson of Matrix Indoor Percussion to explain their keys to success.
Laying the groundwork for future success is as important as making the group successful in a particular year. Instructors should develop shortterm and long-term goals and stick to them. Keep working on technique. It will allow the performers to relax more towards the end of the season and perform to their fullest potential. We spend up to a couple months worth of weekends on just training. The more training and technique the performers have, the easier the choreography and cleaning process will be.
Continuing to introduce new skills keeps the members on their toes and develops their ability to constantly adapt. Keep them engaged by breaking down checkpoints, count structure, plane coverage, and so on. Engage them mentally to keep things enjoyable, explaining in detail why they do what they do.
Excellence is a product of consistency, but the ensemble can only be consistent day-to-day. Retaining involvement of members who care about the organization, even after they graduate or age out, develops year-to-year consistency. Once a core group of members understands the techniques and design process, they’ll be able to guide the new kids. Building consistency is a constant process. But the more you build, the easier it is to maintain what you’ve built.
“Continuing to introduce new skills keeps the members on their toes.”
Create a plan for the week, share it with your Adhering to the timeline keeps everyone on the same track. Stay on schedule with technique time. If the younger members see the older ones continually working on fundamentals, they’ll accept that as how things are done. on everything in one rehearsal. We use class time for technique 28 wgi focus
The most consistent organizations have an identity that transcends any given show, and a way of doing things that is consistent year to year. It can be dangerous to try something new every year without remembering why people like your group. Have something in your show that reminds the audience who they’re watching. www.wgi.org
scholarship
It’s All in Character ayala
“I know it will be hard, but trust me, I can do it.”
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the WGI ScholarShIp proGram
Since its inception, the WGI Scholarship program has provided more than $500,000 to deserving young people. the money for these scholarships comes from the 50/50 If you are interested in donating to the WGI Scholarship Fund, please send your donation to: WGI Scholarship Donation, 2405 crosspointe Drive, Dayton, oh 45342 For more on the WGI Scholarship program, visit wgi.org/contents/scholarship.html 30 wgi focus
Byron Phung is one of 20 performers who received WGI Scholarships in 2013. www.wgi.org
what’s your WGIQ?
wgi.org/wgiq.
34 wgi focus
www.wgi.org