Interview with Allegoria's own, Corri Geis

Hey fellow bloggers and DCI/WGI fans! I am very excited about this week's post! Last week I got the chance to sit down and interview with Corri Geis, a freshman at UC and a first year member of Allegoria Winterguard. Being new to the WGI scene myself, I was very curious to hear from the perspective of an actual current member of a WGI color guard.

Now before I started asking my big questions, I asked her to describe her background and past experience with color guard prior to WGI. She told me that she had spun for 3 years at Lakota West High School within their winter guard as well as the marching band and then mentioned that her winter guard placed 2nd in WGI her senior year. So it makes sense that since she was already involved with WGI in high school, that she has continued to stay involved now in college. With that in mind, I then decided to ask her why she chose to audition for Allegoria instead of just staying with the UC Bearcat Winter Guard, and her answer was intriguing. Her response was, “I think it was better for me on a skill level because I feel like I can be pushed to be better. I love UC but I feel like Allegoria pushes me to be a better spinner and it improves my talent.” Corri also mentioned that the choice to audition for Allegoria was a joint decision between her and her best friend Callie Goodpaster. They spun together in color guard through high school and have now brought their talents to Allegoria to be challenged and experience WGI on a great new level!

Next on my agenda for our interview was to find out more about Allegoria's 2015 show, Pennies from Heaven, and here's what she told me: “Well our show is based off the poem, Pennies from Heaven, and the poem is about how her [the author's] mom died and when she finds pennies on the ground they are messages from her mother saying like, ‘I love you’ and ‘I’m proud of you’. So our whole show is like us being the angels and delivering the message to the audience that if you have a loved one that has passed on, they are sending messages to you that they love you and are proud of you and are thinking of you.” Corri told me that she loves the show and was amazed by how they are able to move and inspire their audiences with their performances. She made sure to say that her favorite part of the show is the flag feature because they are all in unison and its a very powerful and beautiful moment in the show. 

I also asked Corri if she was aware of any rivalries within WGI and she definitely mentioned the rivalry between Onyx and Pride of Cincinnati, but she doesn't think that Allegoria is involved in any rivalries at this point. On a serious note, I then asked how confident she was in their show with WGI World Championships only a month away and her response was very hopeful. She told me that she believes that Pennies from Heaven has great potential and holds a very strong emotional factor that adds to the show significantly, which should do a good job of impressing the judges. She knows that they still have a lot of practicing to do to get the show up to peak performance, but is still very confident. Corri said that Allegoria scored an 83.94 at a competition in Milford 2 weeks ago and at their most recent competition at Xavier University they scored an impressive 84.48! Both times they came in 1st place! I think she and I both agree that we can expect even higher scores from Allegoria in the weeks to come.

As our interview drew to a close, Corri did say that she hopes to continue and most likely stay with Allegoria next year, but it depends on which of her friends plan on returning next. Either way, Corri told me that she will absolutely keep spinning because its what she loves to do. In conclusion, I asked her to share what she would say to anyone considering to audition for a WGI color guard. Her message was, "I think that if that's what they want to do, they should definitely do it. Its a great experience and you get to make so many new friends, and if you make it, you get better. They push you to become a better spinner and you just make lifelong memories and friendships that are nice to have."

Interviewing with Corri was definitely a pleasure and was certainly enlightening, interesting, and fun. I wish her and the rest of Allegoria the best of luck in the future, especially at WGI World Championships in Dayton on April 18th! I highly recommend to anybody interested in WGI to catch a show and watch Allegoria perform Pennies from Heaven sometime soon! Later y'all!