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Re: What are we going to play?

To: brass-band@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: What are we going to play?
From: J.Alexander@xxxxxxxxxxx (J.Alexander)
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 12:09:47 +1000
Priority: low
Reply-to: brass-band@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Sorry I can't pop over to play in the internet band, but I can't help
commenting about Tim Morgan's suggestion:

>BTW, I think our programme should include at least one test piece.

No, no! This just encourages propagation of the species!! Of the "test
pieces" I've played or heard I can't really think of a recent one (past 20
years?) which was a consistently good piece of music.  Composers of test
pieces seem to put aside artistic taste in favour of

     (a) Let's give 'em something really hard to play - some fast unison
arpeggios in the lower register for the bottom end of the band... a few top
C sharps and Ds - never mind that the passage would be better suited for a
higher instrument.

     (b) Give the conductor something to think about. How about a bar of
7/16 time in the middle of a 3/8 passage.?  Never mind that no listener
would ever know about it without the score to follow.

     (c) Let's give  'em an impossible balance problem.   Every section
playing at once, but in different rhythms and different tunes, and all ff,
with a crescendo to fff over the last ten bars.

     (d) Must show how up to date I am.  A few whole-tone scales, like that
really modern composer Debussy.  Maybe a tone-row like that other modern
composer, Schoenberg.  Polytonality - that's good, just like Percy Grainger
(was he really an Australian?).

I'm serious about this.  It becomes obvious when you hear several
performances of the same piece at a contest, and also when you compare A
Grade with lower grade test pieces - the latter are more enjoyable as
pieces of music.

How are test-pieces created anyway?  I believe most are commissioned, so
you can't blame the composer for turning out what he thinks the
commissioners want.  If we must have contests, maybe there should be one
for composers as well, or maybe test pieces should just be chosen from the
standard repertoire.

I don't know of any other musical competition which has its own test
pieces.  Oh well, maybe brass bands aren't musical anyway.

Jack Alexander
First Baritone Horn
Waverley  Bondi Beach Band
Sydney   AUSTRALIA

J.Alexander@xxxxxxxxxxx


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