Contest Season: Part One by E.C. Moore
Spring is at hand, the time to review basic tips for preparing for contests
Spring is at hand, the season when a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love–and a band director's, to the band contest. To paraphrase a well-known verse:
Breathes there a director with soul so dead
Who never to himself has said
I want my band to be ahead
And win a first division!
Why do adjudicators select certain bands upon which to bestow high ratings? Of course, the reason is apparent. A combination of the band that plays perfectly, conducted by a musicianly and artistic director, usually results in "Superior–First Division." Sweet words.
It must never be forgotten that even in noncompetitive festivals or concerts, a band is being judged by the same high standards that prevail in competitive festivals. Music critics, parents and other band directors in the audience are making a critical appraisal of every detail of the performance.
Contests are really won during rehearsals. At rehearsals the director must be a critical judge of the performance. This represents a handicap, as it is difficult to criticize objectively when one is as close to the band as its director.
(This is also true with individual performers. They are much too close to their instruments to hear them properly. A good teacher is a better judge of individual tone quality than the performer can ever be.)
The director is much like a painter, who must back away from the canvas in order to see his work in proper perspective. What a band really sounds like and how its director thinks it sounds can be widely divergent. In spite of best intentions, many directors tend to develop "blind spots" with regard to certain phases of performance, and they may overlook certain faults only because these are heard day after day and have become the norm.
At contests, the first impression made on adjudicators is visual, so a well-disciplined, professional appearance never detracts from the final rating. It is questionable, however, that a favorable impression is made when the band marches onstage, makes pomp and ceremony out of being seated and then leaves a color guard and a few majorettes standing rigidly at attention during the next half hour. Adjudicators get so concerned about the poor youngsters who stand at attention for so long, they may neglect important details of the performance.
Adjudicators are impressed by the band that acts like a professional group: seats itself quietly, quickly, in conventional formations and allows sufficient room for individual players; is neat in appearance and notable in that "foot beaters" are absent; maintains music stands at a proper height; sits erect and with good posture so that each member can keep an eye on the conductor.
The next impact made on the adjudicators is aural. The band begins to play–and at this point first impressions play a disproportionately influential part in an adjudicator's calculations. Please do not misconstrue that statement as being a defense of the fact; I wish only to draw attention to the importance of the warm-up march. When this is played poorly, it takes a lot of beautiful playing later to alter the negative first impression.
The same careful attention must be given to preparing a march as to more extended numbers. Here are a few things about playing a march that adjudicators don't like:
The first is playing at excessive speeds. A march played too rapidly is no longer a march; it becomes a "circus galop." When played too fast, marches lose clarity and crispness. The second is a march in which the afterbeats are played in a draggy fashion. Afterbeats must be played clearly, crisply and with a slight anticipation. Adjudicators also frown on the overuse of lyra bells, xylophone or marimba. For example, the warm, mellow sonority of the trio melody in a march, as played by baritones and on the lower register of the clarinets, is not enhanced when bells tinkle out the same melody two octaves higher.
Another thing that disturbs adjudicators is a failure to use the cymbals with the bass drum. When the bass drum beat is accompanied by a light touch on the cymbals, it sounds with a nice snap and edge. The overall sonority of a band is muffled by the continued use of bass drum alone minus the cymbals. One good way to destroy precision is to allow the bass drummer to drag behind the beat with "thud" strokes made at the dead center of the drumhead. And when basses continually gasp for breath and "scoop" into tones, precision and vitality are affected much in the same way.
A march, an art form, should be played as artistically as a movement from a symphony. It is not in good taste to blare out a march at a furious rate of speed. This type of performance never creates a favorable impression with the capable, musicianly adjudicator.
So much for the "shalt nots." In Part Two of this discussion, we shall explore those aspects of performance that impress adjudicators favorably, as well as the rehearsal methods that can help produce these desired effects.
E. C. Moore, a prominent music educator, was author of "The Band Book," first published by Leblanc Educational Publications in the 1960s and still in print today. This article is a revised excerpt from that publication.
