25 Years of the European Brass Band Championships

Various bands & conductors
Thomas Ruedi (euphonium)
Doyen: DOY CD156
Total Playing Time: 190.49 mins

~ Buy with 4barsrest shopping

25 years of any musical event deserves to be marked in some way, and none more so than the 25th anniversary of the European Brass Band Championships.

Doyen have compiled a 3-cd set comprising some notable performances, from Black Dyke winning the very first competition in 1978 right up to YBS's success on "Chain" in 2002, marking a number of other milestones on the way, such as the conductors', composers' and soloists' competitions introduced in more recent years.

Thirteen out of the first twenty-five contests have taken place in the United Kingdom, including the first five, and the dominance of British bands is clear from the track listing. This is even more apparent when the
conductors are taken into account, in that all the winning performances included by bands in the "A" section are conducted by Britons. Only one non-British conductor has led their band to victory, that being Frans Violet with Brass Band Willebroeck in 1993. On that occasion they finished 5th in the Set Work, and 2nd in the Own Choice, and it is Brass Band Berner Oberland's winning performance of "Sounds" under James Gourlay that has been included here.

The informative notes by Markus Bach and Roy Newsome point out that, for the first few years, there were no restrictions on numbers (now set at 35 players) and that some bands used trumpets and French horns. In 1994 a "B" competition was introduced, with the aim of encouraging players and bands in countries where the "British brass band" was still developing. The single "B" band performance, Froschl Hall, from Austria, is of particular note as the set piece, "The Bandsman's Challenge", was commissioned after Bertrand Moren had won the 1998 composers' competition.

A soloists' competition took place for the first time in 1999, and was won by the Swiss euphonium virtuoso Thomas Ruedi. His performance of the "Horovitz Euphonium Concerto", recorded at the gala concert, is one of the highlights of the set. The following year, in Birmingham, was the turn of the aspiring conductors, and the honours were taken by Josee R.P.Viaplana from Spain. Particular mention should be made of the stamina shown by JJB Sports (Leyland), who, in addition to their fine rendition here of Wilby's "Paganini Variations", also performed two other complete test pieces, as well as one section of another that they had to play three times, before finishing with a half-hour programme!

The first disc opens with "Fanfare and Flourishes", written by James Curnow in connection with the 1991 event, and featuring Charpentier's "Te Deum", adopted as the Eurovision theme and very familiar to those who remember watching "Jeux Sans Frontieres"! He had also composed "Trittico" for the 1989 contest, played here by Eikanger-Bjorsvik Musikklag under Howard Snell, who also appears fronting Desford ("Year of the Dragon"), Eikanger again ("Variations on an Enigma") and Britannia Building Society (a very exciting rendition of Philip Sparke's "A London Overture").

Black Dyke, who dominated the first ten years of the contest, winning seven times under Major Peter Parkes, are also heard under James Watson from 1995 (Ronald Wiltgen's "Red Earth"), but not under David King, who was successful in 1990 and 1991. He is represented here by two performances with YBS, Piet Swerts' "Chain" from 2002 and the only Own Choice work included, Herbert Howells' "Pageantry" from 1997. Buy As You View Cory under Robert Childs appear with their rendition of Carl Rutti's "Montreux Wind Dances", that won the Set Piece section in 2001.

As would be expected from competition-winning performances, the playing is exciting as one can feel the sense of occasion, even if the odd unfortunate blip does seem more noticeable on repeated listening, and it is probably true to say that there are technically cleaner versions around of many of the works here. The presentation of the set is excellent, with an overview of the development of banding in Europe, as well as the history of the competition itself and notes on each track. It is also interesting to have an overview of some of the test pieces that have been commissioned, although Torstein Aagaard-Nilsen's "Seid", which raised a few eyebrows in 1996, is not here.

The one question that nags away is that of who the target audience will be for a recording such as this. Whilst it is good to have so many fine performance gathered together, there may be considerable duplication with discs already in one's collection - Dyke's winning versions of "Introduction, Elegy and Caprice" and "Symphonic Music", for example, are to be found on the Chandos cd "Volcano", and many keen listeners are likely to already own the highlights recordings from the past few years. Equally, there will be those who will regret the omissions, less familiar works such as Arthur Butterworth's "Caliban", Henk Badings' "Ciacona Seria", Jean Balissat's "Chant de l'Alpe" or Thomas Wilson's "Refrains and Cadenzas", for example. At around £25 the set is not cheap, but represents a very enjoyable three hours or so of music making if the programme appeals and does not entail too much duplication.

Peter Bale

~ Buy with 4barsrest shopping

^back to top