Klarinet Archive - Posting 000251.txt from 2002/10

From: w9wright@-----.net (William Wright)
Subj: Re: [kl] Marching band --- not what I expected
Date: Sun, 6 Oct 2002 21:03:24 -0400

<><> Natalie signed her name:
Natalie *who hides underneath her soapbox to escape the masses*:

Natalie, it's both a pleasure and *valuable* to hear from a young person
who actually participates in marching band. Thank you for posting!

=============

<><> Of course it may not be as musical as it would be standing still or
sitting.

There is a line of thought, fairly well documented (such as in Anthony
Storr, "Music and the Mind"), that music was originally an inseparable
part of communication (of speech), and if the musical aspects of pitch
and rhythm were not done correctly, the content of the language was
unintelligible. Over the millenia, music did become separated from
speech, and now even the flattest tone of speaking voice is
understandable, although not the most effective.

But we _should_ remember (imo) that music is part of a larger structure.
Over-specialization can do as much damage as unfocused training can do.

===========

<><> And could you imagine a football game without the band playing
music every five minutes? And what would happen during half-time?

<=BIG CHUCKLE=, but also =BIG GRIPE!=>

Believe it or not, at the football games of my daughter's school (I went
to one two nights ago), there were at least a thousand people in the
stands, probably closer to two or three thousand, and the half time show
was an amplified CD player (which didn't work all the time) with some
cheer leaders waving their pom-poms and doing a few simple gymnastics.
It's been that way for several years now.

I do miss a proper half time show and a well-played fight song.

Our schools have multiple bands and choirs (classical, jazz, marching,
popular, baroque, etc), but they don't do half-time shows. One of them
won first place in a national school competition back East somewhere and
will tour Europe (at least partly on some organization's nickel) this
summer as their reward. The 'band' that toots a few bars when our team
scores a touchdown is a dozen or so kids who would rather sit together
on the 50-yard line than roam the stadium looking for dates & friends &
parties. They use the crowd as an excuse to 'jam' sometimes --- jazz,
rock-and-roll, movie themes, etc.

Perhaps my daughter's school is the sort of school of which Karl Krelove
and others would approve? Perhaps one of the groups won a national
title and a trip to Europe precisely because they _didn't_ have to mess
with football games or marching?

=========

All told, and once again, I agree that any educational program can be
carried too far.

But I continue to object to the isolationist and clique-ish attitude
that music is a 'pure' discipline all to itself. It didn't start out
that way, and thankfully it still isn't completely that way.

Cheers,
Bill

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