Bass drum tuning for indoor drumline: How do you muffle the drums? #marchingpercussion #bassline #tuning
— Marching Percussion (@MarchingPerc) January 17, 2017
Working in A Domed Environment
by DJ Montalbano
Former Percussion Coordinator
Syracuse University Marching Band
Introduction
It is a cool autumn day, and your entire band is out on the field, along with the rest of your organization. It’s the day before one of your major regional marching band competitions. Here you are with your entire staff working on ensemble balance, projection from the percussion, timing control issues, and anything that may need tweaking. Finally, the rehearsal’s end arrives and you find yourself en route to the task of the evening.
When your band gets on the field, you and your staff decide to head upstairs to witness the show from a judge’s standpoint. Of course you would like to get the full effect! The show begins and things are just not right! You can see the faces of individuals in your ensemble working just as hard as they always do in rehearsals and they seem a bit relaxed yet a bit aggressive. They are working just as normal, but all of the important things including balance, timing, and projection just are not better, in fact they are worse! Then you look up and realize you are in a Domed arena. What went wrong?