In my series of posts about different musical instruments, I have, over time, managed to cover most of the most common instruments that feature in Western music – those instruments that your children are most likely to be learning to play, or to come across in some way during their time in education at least. So rather than either go back over those instruments I have already written about, or write about less common instruments (which is something I may well do in future years), I thought I would now use my Facts About… series of posts to talk about the most common ensembles that your children will listen to, see perform, or maybe play or sing in. Again, my focus is on ensembles that feature in Western traditions, and it may well be that in the future I look at musical instruments and ensembles from other musical traditions, but for now I will stick with what I know. You can read my other blog posts in this series on ensembles by clicking on the links below:
Facts About The String Quartet
What is a Brass Band, and Who Performs In It?
- A brass band can be a variety of different sizes, from a smaller ensemble, to a very large group of musicians.
- The brass band is made up from musicians from the following families of musical instruments:
- The Brass Family
- The Percussion Family
- It is, however, overwhelmingly for brass players, as the title of the band would suggest.
- While I suggested above that a brass band can be of varying different sizes, this is largely true especially for school bands. However, for a traditional brass band, the make up of that band is very specific. In a traditional brass band the following musicians would play:
- 1 soprano cornet in Eb
- 9 cornets in Bb
- 1 flugel horn in Bb
- 3 tenor horns in Eb
- 2 baritone horns in Bb
- 2 tenor trombones
- 1 bass trombone
- 2 euphoniums in Bb
- 4 tubas
- 2 or 3 percussion players with 2 or more players who play timpani, glockenspiel, snare drum, triangle, cymbals, drum kit or other percussion instruments.
- In terms of where the players will sit in a brass band, like other ensembles they will generally sit in a semi-circle arranged around the conductor. The cornets will generally be on the left hand side of the conductor, the trombones on the right, horns and basses in the middle with percussion behind the basses.
History of the Brass Band
- I wrote last month about the wind band, or concert band and much that I wrote about the development of wind bands would be relevant to the development of brass bands as well. Especially in that wind band features brass instruments as well as wind instruments, and both wind and brass instruments underwent many changes over the years. Many wind and brass instruments became the musical instruments that we are familiar with today around about the same time, in the mid- to late-19th Century.
- It was in the 1830s that composer Wilhelm Wieprecht put together a brass cavalry ensemble to show off what new, valved brass instruments were capable of doing.
- The Blaine Band in Monmouthshire, South Wales, seems to have been the first band to become and all-brass band in around 1832.
- The Industrial Revolution in the UK had an effect on how musicians gathered together to form bands. People moved into more urban areas centred around Industrial areas and bands with just brass instruments, excluding any wind or other instruments, started to form. These were often in places like mining communities. Why mining communities? Well mining was a hard, dangerous place of work. Miners worked long shifts together in gruelling, stressful conditions and coming together to play in a band was a way for the workers to try to alleviate some of the stresses that they were subjected to.
- The colliery brass band movement was a force for good in the lives of the miners and their families as the men would play concerts, perform at sporting events and in pubs. They would hold marches through the town on a Sunday and any money raised from these activities would go towards both maintaining the bands and also to try to improve the lives and living conditions of the townsfolk including the women and children living there.
- In the Victorian period the holiday industry in the UK took off, with people flocking to parks and coastal destinations when they had time off, and brass bands became quite the fixture in holiday destinations. The bands were able to play not only music written specifically for brass bands, but also versions of music from the latest operas, giving people the chance to hear music they would otherwise not be able to hear.
- It is said that at the height of their popularity there were an estimated 10,000 to 40,000 brass bands in the UK!
- In 1865 The Salvation Army was formed by William Booth. Its aim was to advance the Christian religion, and The Salvation Army made extensive use of brass bands in its work, and brass bands are still very much associated with this organisation today.
- If you were around in the 1990s you may well have watched the film Brassed Off which featured the mining town’s brass band and their version of Concerto de Aranjuez, sometimes referred to in the film as “The Concerto D’Orange Juice”. This was performed for the film by The Grimethorpe Colliery Band, based in Barnsley, South Yorkshire and the film tells the story of how the local community is affected by the closing down of their town’s pit, and the role that playing in the brass band helps them deal with the resulting changes in their lives.
- Previous readers of this blog will probably know that my son is a trombone player, and so brass bands have very much become a feature of our lives in the last year or so. And we have heard him play a huge variety of music with that band, from traditional brass band repertoire to the theme to the Bond movies, to a brass band version of a Coldplay song!
- So today brass bands play a huge variety of music. Much like other ensembles they play music written specifically for brass bands as well as versions of other orchestral works, film TV theme tunes and pop songs – at one Brass Band competition we went to with our son one of the bands did a medley of 1990s northern pop songs, which for me was incredibly nostalgic!
Brass Band World Records
- The Guiness World Record for the largest brass band was gained on 1 June 2008 by the Evangelische Posaunendienst in Deutschland e.V. at the WM Stadium, in Leipzig, Germany when an absolutely enormous 15,761 musicians gathered together to play in a massed band!
- On 28 March 2022, brass band conductor Tom Street, from Belper in the UK won the Guiness World Record for the longest serving member of a brass band. At the time he had been a member of the Heage Silver Band for 82 years and 332 days!
Sources, especially for historical information
- http://www.bournemouthanddistrictconcertband.co.uk
- https://www.classical-music.com/articles/the-history-of-the-brass-band-how-brass-bands-began-and-why-they-remain-popular
- https://www.firstbrass.co.uk/information.php#:~:text=To%20combat%20the%20monotony%20and,50%2C000%20miners%20and%20their%20families.
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