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Re: Allowing professional players in brassbands

Trond Otto Berg wrote:

(massive snip):

> If some band pay their members to play with them two things should
> happen:
> 1. The player should be banned from contests for life.
> 2. The band should be banned for at least two years.
> We are a amateur movement, not a pro league, AND WE DONT WANT TO BE IT.
> There is already too much monney going around in the top bands. 


>   Trond  Otto Berg
>   Principal
>   Stranda Music School, Norway
>

Dear Trond

1) Don't you think that we are already sufficiently divided?  If 
we're going to invent new rules (heaven forbid - we already have 
enough!) we should make rules which enable us to make our musical 
activities more inclusive, not less.

2) Problems of definition are becoming more difficult all the time as
musicians diversify their roles, becoming involved in education, 
community work, promotion, recording, publishing etc.  Very few
professionals spend all of their time playing.  How could you possibly
verify whether or not I (or anybody else) earned 49% of my income from
playing, with sufficient accuracy to make a reliable decision?  Would I need
to take my bank statements or a copy of my tax return to contests, to
present at registration, or would a chat with my accountant suffice
( - be careful though, he's certainly a professional!).  In reality, the ratio
between 'money earned from playing' and 'money earned from other 
sources' will change from one year to the next.

3) Many of our top players started with brass bands - see this week's 
BB; is it not right that they should be able to put something back?  
In today's employment climate when people have to move around to 
wherever the work is, we can't restrict people to the band that they played
with before they turned professional.

4) The effect of putting a handful of professionals into an average 
band (whatever that is) doesn't instantly transform it into Black 
Dyke!  At the Albert Hall the other week one band played two of the 
band movement's professionals on solo cornet and solo euphonium, but 
they didn't win - far from it.  But it could help the other players 
in the band to raise their standards with lasting effect: would you want
to ban that too?.

5) Professional players are expensive!  Few bands could afford to buy 
in pro. players at MU rates to rehearse on a regular basis. (Personally I
would sooner conduct a band who turned up to rehearsals each week, to
play decent music on good instruments, but it is a question of priorities and I 
wouldn't want see rules in force which stopped any band spending its
money in the way it chose to do).  If a band takes the decision to pay 
'expenses' or 'retainers' to its players it does so at the expense of 
something else and takes the risk that those players might leave if 
the money runs out or if they get a better offer elsewhere.  It's their 
decision.

6) I would very much like to hear a band of real pro. players, well 
rehearsed and directed, tackling serious repertoire, in competition 
with our best bands.  If they were so good it might just inspire us all
to raise our standards.

The fact that it hasn't happened may tell a different story...

David


David Lancaster

-Senior Lecturer in Music
-University College of Ripon and York St John
-<d.lancaster@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
-tel: (01765) 602691 fax: (01765) 600516


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