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Re: Contesting

Alec Gallagher posed some tricky questions for a Monday morning...

DL:
> >The concept of a 'Movement' is now rather archaic and anachronistic,
> >but there doesn't seem to be a better term to describe the very rapid
> >growth, development and popularity of bands and their music in the
> >nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.  It stands alongside other
> >'movements' such as those of Trade Unionist's Movement, Womens
> >Movement, Labour Movement and so on which form an important part of
> >British history over the last couple of hundred years.

AG:
> My dictionary defines a movement as 'a group of people with a common
> ideology', and defines 'ideology' as 'a body of ideas that reflects the
> beliefs of a (group).  In the case of Trades Unions, Suffragettes, Labour
> etc., the word seems appropriate.  I wonder what you think the common
> ideology that binds brass bands together is?

DL:
Winning contests!  No, seriously, I really wouldn't like to
speculate.   The points I was trying to make were firstly that the
bandsmen of that period clearly thought of themselves as a
movement (at a time when there were lots of movements), and
secondly, that Robin needn't feel ostracised by this antiquated
terminology.  I certainly didn't say 'we are a movement' or that 'the
modern concept of a band movement is a good thing'.  No no no.  My
dictionary says that 'anachronistic' means 'something that is
chronologically out of place'.  Dictionaries at 50 paces...

AG:
> It also occurs to me that all the examples you give above all had a central
> organising body.  I don't think there has ever been such a body for brass
> bands, has there?  Given that brass bands have been around for about 180
> years, the 'movement' seems to have had some trouble getting moving.

DL:
Agreed that we have always lacked a central organising body and that
movement in some directions is very slow motion indeed.  In some ways
that makes the explosion in popularity of bands in the middle of
the 19th century all the more remarkable - a popular movement?

DL:
> > Some of 'our' most popular composers (Philip Sparke, Philip Wilby, Gilbert
> > Vinter and others) ... (have) 'broken the mould' of what contest pieces are
> > supposed to be...

AG:
> As a non-musicologist, I would be very interested to hear exactly what
> contest pieces are 'supposed to be', and how the three composers  you
> mention above have broken the mould in this respect.

DL:
I'm not a musicologist either but we surely can generalise about the
form that contest pieces have taken, in the same way that we can
generalise about the development of conventions surrounding string
quartets, concertos, operas, tone poems etc.

I chose these three composers as examples because an earlier
correspondant had suggested that music for contests was only composed
by brass band 'insiders' and that contesting didn't encourage
'outside' composers to write for band; these three had made their
names as composers before they came to write music for band.  (I'd
really like to see lots more 'outside' composers writing for band but
that means finding money for commission fees.  Since bands themselves
rarely commission large scale pieces only our bigger music festivals
and major contests seem to have the financial clout to bring such new
pieces into existence).

All three composers have been regarded as revolutionary in some ways;
Vinter for example, brought a more dissonant harmonic language,
irregular rhythms and more extended use of percussion.  All the fuss
about Spectrum tells us that he was doing something new, so far as
bandsmen and their audiences were concerned.

Cheers

David


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