The Surprise Adjudicator – the tape starts somewhere during the first selection and the judge starts commenting of the performance. Nowhere does this person indicate who he or she is, where the festival is taking place, nor the date of the festival. Not much help to the director if more information is desired.

Mr. Nice Guy – certainly doesn’t want to offend anyone, so this judge only makes positive comments. It’s lovely that the group looks nice, sits erect and pays attention to the director, but what does the music sound like? Help!

Guest Lecturer – sounds like that college professor you had who use to talk and talk and talk some more, but never really said anything. The subject used by this judge is that one he or she always wanted to write a book about, but never had time.

Heavy Breather – This judge has never heard his or her self on tape before and is unaware that words are lost to sounds that should be coming from an 800 phone call, made by mistake. Plosives pop, mystery sounds sneak out and sometimes even the sounds of whiskers rubbing across the mike can be heard.

Confused Charlie – the bulk of the performance time is spent with this judge shuffling music scores trying to find where the group is. You hear the rattling of papers but no comments about the performance.  “Now, where did my pencil go?”

The Nag – here we are with the judge who has a pet peeve and that is all the director hears about. We know flutists shouldn’t drape their right arm over the back of the chair, but isn’t there something else also worth mentioning?

The Intellectual – this judge is proud of his or her knowledge of every facet of music and is more than willing to share it with young musicians. Unfortunately, most of the comments are way over the head of anyone possessing less that a 150 IQ.

Clueless – this judge might be a fine musician, but somehow has missed out on how to talk to kids and has no idea on how to fix an ensembles problems.

The Assassin – “Ah, ha!” The group finally hit on this judge’s favorite wrongdoing, and are you going to hear about it. Now this judge also becomes the nag.

The High-Tech Wonder – spends most of the performance time fiddling with his or her tape recorder. Also, just to be safe he or she also brought along a metronome to be sure the music is performed at exactly the tempo listed, and a calculator to add up those difficult points at the end of the performance. Using a tuner can also help the judge be sure the group is right on.

Your Problem, not mine – this is every directors’ favorite judge. Every single item that needs work is pointed out. Thanks, but how can the director fix it? That’s why the group came to the festival in the first place. If the director knew how to solve a particular problem it would have been attended to before the festival.

The ABA Adjudicator – starts on a positive note (sorry about the pun), saying something nice about what the group did well (A), then picks several important areas that need improvement and gives ways to fix the problems (B), and concludes with another positive statement that will make the director want to bring the group back to a festival next year (A).

After a self-evaluation an adjudicator should select areas that need improvement in her or her work. There are many ways to become a better adjudicator. Work on this so you’ll be ready for the first festival.

In reviewing the directors’ evaluations of adjudicators, most of the negative comments were regarding the improper use of the tape recorder. As we are not writing comments along with the tape recording, an accurate and articulate tape is of prime importance. If the tape is difficult to hear, or worse yet, if it is blank, the festival experience for that group and its director is a complete waste of time. Poor tape speed, bad balance and volume and other items resulting in a poor tape quality must be avoided.

Now the tie-in with the conference – this year both of the Adjudication Sessions (one on Friday and one on Saturday) will be devoted to the proper use of the tape recorder in festival situations. Every adjudicator attending should bring his or her actual tape recorder used at festivals, along with a blank tape. We will work with them, evaluate the results of actual tapes made at the conference, and hopefully, cure ourselves in this one most important area.

We have a fine adjudication staff that are constantly seeking ways to improve. I hope this article will motivate all to becoming even better. Have a great festival season, and I’ll see you at San Jose State University on January 11^th or 12^th.

Orrin C. Cross III

Adjudication Director

May, 2007

Adjudication, by its very nature, is always highly suspect. Whether it is a Supreme Court decision on a controversial topic, a referee’s invoking that “tuck rule” on a snowy football field in New England (Raider’s fans will remember this one), or an adjudicator awarding a rating to a young musical group at a festival, the final decision is always open to criticism. Those of us who take our groups to various music festivals know that they vary greatly in quality, difficulty and reliability. Some festivals pretty much require only that you show up, to receive a high rating. Some are designed to justify to parents and school officials the reason for taking groups on trips. Some are so critical that directors and students have no desire to ever return to them again. Some are designed to evaluate a group’s performance in a kind, yet educational, manner. I hope the Bay Section, CMEA qualifies for the latter example.

In order to maintain and improve the standards of adjudication, please complete all of the information requested for each adjudicator.