The Brass Band Forum

I have just read an interesting extract by Ken Dennison which states that the different sounds you get in brass bands around the country are tied up with the way the people there speak/ For example, Yorkshire bands have a rich, swelling sound, like the Yorkshire accent. In the Midlands the sound is harder edged in bands and the accent.
I thought this was quite interesting and Im interested in phonetics etc so please contribute...
Tash

well, i'm not sure about that, but our conductor is always saying that southern bands have no sound at all!

hmm... no sound at all? Must just sit there and not play anything I suppose...

Considering you do tend to get several bands from the same area with very different sounds, I'd need to see evidence of location affecting sound - for example I come from a band that has another Championship Section band literally just down the road in the same town, and we have VERY different sounds.

Also, surely the fact that we live in a multi-cultural society would mean that with so many different accents etc in each area any possible affect would be, at the very least, extremely limited?! Not to mention that not all players in each band come from the same place - for example there are some in my band that travel best part of an hour to get there from one direction, and others who travel half an hour from the opposite direction. With the variety of different levels of accent in Cornwall, I can go to other places and not understand a word of what they're saying because the accent is so different to that which I'm used to in the town in which I live.

It is an interesting concept, though.

Trace

well,

I am always taking the piss out of the band i conduct for being southern (especially the basses)

But maybe if the band has no 'sound' the MD should do some band training..... oh, and buy in a strong bass section!

Its all rubbish.

Individuals aspire to sounds like other individuals from other parts of the country.
Whole bands aim to sound better than the rest.

For an example of how rubbish this suggestion is.... Take away a mans instrument (or the whole bands!) in the middle of a hymn... and tell them to keep playing....... Does it sound english, irish scottish or welsh?
interesting phonetics eh?!
Or does it sound like a monkey's tea party?
If it does sound like a monkey's tea party can you spot what area of the country the monkey's come from???...no?
hence proof!......rubbish idea.



If anything, the conductor will foam a bands sound..... or even; generations of musical direction.

[quote="jp_euph"]well,

I am always taking the piss out of the band i conduct for being southern (especially the basses)

But maybe if the band has no 'sound' the MD should do some band training..... oh, and buy in a strong bass section![/quote]

lol

we don't have [i]no[/i] sound at all, but he's always saying we'll never be as good as bands from yorkshire, cos we can't blow a full ff. He does, however, say we compensate by being able to play pppp!

Is he by any chance from Yorkshire then? Because that sounds more like bias on his part than anything else. Also, that opens the door for discussion... Does he mean sound or dynamics? Surely the conductor can tell the difference...

[quote]Is he by any chance from Yorkshire then? [/quote]

Nope! Just plain old down south like the rest of us!


[quote]Does he mean sound or dynamics? Surely the conductor can tell the difference...[/quote]

By a full ff, i don't mean loud, but full sounding. Anyone can blast a note on a brass instrument, but to be able to produce a full ff takes work (more work than we put in, according to him!). But there really is no pleasing our conductor sometimes, but you get used to it and learn to accept that "ok" is very high praise!

I disagree. My cousins - who don't generally play - can each blast a note on my instrument and the volume is totally different although the sound is exactly the same (terrible, as is usually the case when it's blasted...)

Although a bigger fuller sound will obviously make a note sound louder, that isn't the only factor. And also, who's to say that a southern band can't develop a big full sound like any other band and who's to say that a Yorkshire band with a full sound can't play pppp?!

Also, does that claim therefore mean that every band in Yorkshire in addition to the Championship section, e.g. youth bands, has a bigger sound than the Championship bands of the South?

Tracey

Being a southerner who's lived "up north" for 15 years I can tell you that I don't believe that theory.

I think it's down to what the players and more importantly the conductor wants and expects.

The only point of illumination I could argue is that some extremely good bands originate from Yorkshire (no-one could deny this 'we all know').... and within these bands even the back row cornets are not afraid to to be felt.....ie all players have equal confidence....
This is due to the quality of the players and not the area they come from however.
Also.... many of us here Yorkshire bands from professional recordings. You would be amazed at the sound a studio can achieve when applying a pro-reverb rack effect to a sound take. (not taking anything away from the quality of the players - but the studio work helps)

An example I could give of a southerner with a nice, big, full sound is one of our horn players. A few years ago John Maines obviously thought the sound was rather too big for a horn, considering he was growing rather irrate with the baritones for not leaving their part off like he'd asked... They weren't playing.

That person is most definitely 100% Cornish. Not from "up north". Therefore it is entirely down to each individual and how they develop their sound, and also down to the band working as a whole. And the way each conductor chooses to train their band. With the right building exercises I believe that everyone is capable of building a bigger rounder fuller sound, and those exercises can be practised no matter where in the world you live.

Woah!

I'm not generalising and saying that no southerners have a full sound. no one said that yorkshire bands can't play pppp. I agree that anyone can have a big sound if they work at it and do it correctly.

But i'm not sure what your point is in this statement.

[quote="traosb"]I disagree. My cousins - who don't generally play - can each blast a note on my instrument and the volume is totally different although the sound is exactly the same (terrible, as is usually the case when it's blasted...) [/quote]

We were establishing in the debate whether volume and sound are two different things and whether anyone can blast out a loud note. I was pointing out that while both my cousins can each blast a loud note, they can't necessarily blast as loud as each other although the sound is pretty much the same in both cases. In short, both my cousins can attempt to play their loudest, but one can still blast louder then the other while sounding the same.

Therefore sound only affects volume to a certain extent, and volume therefore remains dependant upon the player as not everyone can blast as loud as everyone else. In fact, the player who I referred to as having the big full sound was continually told that they were too quiet and was always being asked for more, quashing the argument that a big sound equals more and therefore can't achieve quieter dynamics.

So, the point I was making is that just because someone has a big sound it doesn't mean that they can play loud and can't play quiet, and although everyone can blast a loud note, they can't necessarily blast as loud as everyone else.

Hmm..... I always thought 'a big sound' ment a full, quality tone so you dont hear 'the tin' but by contrast 'a voice' ....at any volume.

'the big sound' is sweet at any volume not brash at FFF or timid at PPP ..... in my book anyway.

just my take on the subject IMHO.