Editorial ~ 2009: January

This month we give our opinion on the dawn of the new age of the Stepford Wife principal cornet; Forgetting the Olympic bandwagon and in praise of Gilbert Vinter.

The rise of the Stepford Wife principal cornet player

The departure of Roger Webster from the Principal Cornet chair at Grimethorpe Colliery Band may well have come as a bit of shock, but its ramifications are perhaps more far reaching than just wondering who will replace him in the hot seat in time for the Regional Championships. 

Being a principal cornet player is much more than just standing up in a concert and rattling off an air-varie solo or making sure you can play the cadenza in the latest test piece. Like the lead violin in an orchestra, they are the conduits through which everything flows from the conductor to the band, the touchstone and foundation block all in one.

The very best combine these talents seamlessly with their playing, allowing a conductor to delegate responsibility through proxy. The ones that remain successful at the very top echelons of the banding tree are those with strong characters and stronger personalities; individuals with a bit of edge, an appreciation of their own talents and very much with an independent mind.

Bands knew what they got when they bought their services – great playing and the occasional bust up.

Today, with the notable exception of one or two long term examples, we have entered the age of the ‘identikit’ principal cornet player.

Young, talented, pliable, cheap, university educated (invariably on a brass band course), trumpet playing, musically conservative, technically secure, lyrically challenged, easily managed, artistically monochrome. 

They confess to being ‘team players’ and ‘in for the long term’, but invariably have CVs longer than Jermaine Defoe.

All in all then – not as good, not as interesting and not half the player they invariably replace.  Cast your mind back just 20 years - and now have a look around you. The age of the 'Stepford Wife' principal cornet player may well be finally upon us.

What do you think?
Send an email to: comments@4barsrest.com       

Forget the Olympic bandwagon

There is now less than 1300 days to go before the 2012 Olympics.

On the 27th July 2012, Britain will come to a standstill (if it hasn’t already by the effects of the worse recession since the 1930s) and will bask in the glory of a London centric jamboree of corporate excess, hyperbole and traffic congestion. It will most probably rain.

The whole Olympic Project is hovering up money like a demented financial Dyson cleaner, yet we constantly hear rumours of the possibility of England wishing to host the European Brass Band Championships in London (or possibly Birmingham) just a few weeks before it all starts.

Before anyone finally loses their marbles (which unfortunately isn’t an Olympic event for the Brits) and believes it a good idea for the BFBB (or anyone else for that matter, if rumours are correct) to try and do it – forget it.

By 2012 there will be no money for anything else other than the Olympics in England. Does anyone really think there will be enough ‘free cash’ around to promote a week long event like this in London or Birmingham for that matter less than three months before Olympic-mania consumes us all in its bloated glory?

However much we would wish another European to come to Britain, lest we forget the problems the BFBB had in promoting the event the last time around – and not even Aston Villa were playing at home on the same weekend then. How big will the loss be this time we wonder if the process is repeated?

If it has to come to these shores in 2012 then why not let the Scots have a go again – they did a pretty good job the last time, and the whole event will be far enough away from London, Lord Coe and those with misplaced Olympic pretensions to be a true musical and financial success in its own right.

We owe the Olympics nothing, and the Olympics are certainly not going to give us anything in exchange either.  It is a bandwagon we should forget about trying to catch. 

What do you think?
Send an email to: comments@4barsrest.com         

In Praise of Gilbert Vinter 

Do you really need to praise the music of Gilbert Vinter? Perhaps we do – and long overdue it is too.

Later this month the RNCM Festival of Brass will celebrate the great man’s output for brass in the centenary year of his birth, whilst the Regionals will see ‘Salute to Youth’ used as the Championship Section set work.

These in themselves are reasons to be grateful, but why now? Surely his work has deserved this recognition before his 100th birthday and not just because of it?

When will we get to hear ‘Spectrum’, ‘Triumphant Rhapsody’, ‘Variations on a Ninth’ and ‘Symphony of Marches’ played regularly again after this month?

Paul Hindmarsh should be congratulated for his efforts at the RNCM – but it rather tells us something about our own attitude towards Vinter that it has taken such an anniversary to remember him at all. 

What do you think?
Send an email to: comments@4barsrest.com        

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