Some of the contents of the pages on this site are Copyright © 2016 NJH Music | [Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index] More on the Open results
I went to the British open and sat for over 7 hours listening to every bands performance. I didn't know the piece before the day so I found it difficult to judge Dyke's performance, but they certainly didn't make any great impression on me. I'm not an adjudicator and I probably wasn't listening for the same things that an adjudicator would listen for but I picked Britania Building Society, Tredegar and Grimethorpe as the three bands which I felt made the music interesting to listen to. Faireys played very precisely and were very controlled - they were probably the best band on the day but to me their performance was lifeless and un-interesting. I must say that I'm still puzzled by the results - Marple and Faireys both played in a similar style (although there were twelve bands between them so I could be mistaken) and Faireys made a much better job of it. Marple were one of very few bands where mistakes were made; the sop missed a few notes and there were several entries that weren't together. So, if that was the style the adjudicators wanted why didn't Faireys win? BUT, I did hear several, well-respected people saying that they thought Marple would win. I'm not taking anything away from Marple. It's an incredible achievement and they've worked very hard for it. All credit to Garry Cutt, their conductor, who's interpretation of Elgar's music won the contest for them. Who are we to judge when Bram Gay, the "editor" of the version of the Severn Suite used for the competition was in the box together with two other excellent musicians. That brings me to the one thing that was desperately lacking from the contest (maybe I missed it when I nipped out to the toilet between the last band and the resuts) - feedback from the adjudicators. Maybe we could understand the results better if we knew what they had been listening for. Two final thoughts: The hall is far from perfect for Brass Band music and the sound is different in different parts of the hall. At the back of the stalls, none of the bands sounded "loud" to us, and in fact some seemed underpower. Maybe if we'd sat next to the adjudicators we would all have come up with the same result? Many top players were disputing the result at the Abbercrombie (many others actually gritted their teeth and shook hands with the Marple team) - but throughout the day there was a distinct lack of players listening to their opponents. They are in no position to judge who won and lost. As always, these are just my personal thoughts on the matter. Don Cooper, cardpc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Don_Cooper -- unsubscribe or receive the list in digest form, mail a message of 'help' to listserv@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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