The wonders of drum corps

[Roark1]

Thanks, JS. b**bs

I have to admit, what you wrote here is exactly what crossed my mind when I read the post about our "large" performers. Chesticles aside, I think the horn makes me look thin. I know this is looking ahead, but I might just wear one of those to banquet next year.

I'm going with "well mammered".

[John H]

Chesticles aside, I think the horn makes me look thin. I know this is looking ahead, but I might just wear one of those to banquet next year.

that's hot

[BigLou]

Did you say "BandCorps" or did you say "DCI"??

I concur Mike. Maybe the title of the thread should be "the wonders of bandcorps". Oops, excuse me, I maybe suspended or ,heaven forbid, banned for not posting what Smoothy and and the rest of DCP wants to hear. So I will post this instead: Cool, man, really hip

Annie

PS Soon to be moving to the great state of Minnesota.

[cin4057]

THAT is sooooo wrong! LOL

It's a joke right?

IMO I rather resent band people coming into our house, so to speak, and rearranging it to suit them.

It's just wrong.

[Gold_Bond]

Get it RIGHT! Those are GD plastic imitations of Sousaphones because "marching members" today are to GD weak and wimpy to carry real brass. Sousaphones have nothing nor have they ever had anything to do with real drum corps.

Eklipse marched sousaphones at the start of 2003. Way to dish on the kids.

Or does that mean that DCI is not real drum corps? :P

[SpartacusRocks]

J. P. Sousa did not invent the Sousaphone. It is named after him in gratitude for suggestions that he made to J. W. Pepper.

Thanks for your feedback. Your reply motivated me to do some sleuthing and here's what I found:

Wikipedia agrees with your point and has, IMHO, a terrific article on the sousaphone but, of course, the authority of wikipedia is a matter of debate. Also Virginia Tech.'s online music dictionary gives joint credit to both Sousa and JWPepper as having invented the sousaphone (www.music.vt.edu/musicdictionary)."Sousaphone: Brass instrument invented by composer and conductor John Philip Sousa, and the instrument maker J. W. Pepper"

The online Encylopedia Brittanica confusses the issue with this: "Helicon: also called Sousaphone, a bass or contrabass tuba built in a spiral circular form and resting on the shoulder. It is believed to have been invented in Russia but was perfected in 1849 by Ignaz Stowasser in Vienna. The helicon is chiefly used in military bands. In the United States, where the bandmaster John Philip Sousa introduced a removable bell, it is usually known as a sousaphone."

The Harvard Dictionary of Music has a see also note under its entry for Sousaphone to Brass Instruments and offers this: "Helicon: This name is used for bass and contrabass tubas in a circular shape...instead of the upright shape of the tubas. The circle is wide enough to allow the player to carry the instrument over his shoulder. An American variety, characterzed by a specially designed bell, is the sousaphone (named after John Philip Sousa, who suggested it)." p. 106b.

Unfortunately, I don't have access to the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians which is, of course, the definitive voice in such matters.

So I'm not sure what to believe, but I wonder about this: The Helicon is a predecessor to the sousaphone. JPSousa made a few suggestions to instrument maker JWPeper to revise the helicon and tuba (e.g. wider bore, removable bell...). Perhaps the sousaphone evolved from the helicon and wasn't really "invented" as something essentially similar to it already existed (i.e. the helicon). JPSousa certainly didn't do it alone, but it doesn't appear that JWPepper did either. Regardless I edited my original post.

Edited February 8, 2007 by SpartacusRocks

[Spandy]

from The New Grove Dictionary Of Music And Musicians

Sousaphone. A type of bass tuba used mainly in marching bands, named after John Philip Sousa (1854-1932). It is distinguished from the rest of the tuba family by its shape and widely flaring bell. Like the HELICON it encircles the player, resting on the left shoulder and passing under the right arm, with the bell pointing forward above the player's head. It is especially popular in America but is also used in some European bands; in the 1920s it sometimes appeared in jazz groups. Like upright band tubas, sousaphones are pitched in Eb and Bb and are non-transposing instruments. Most have three valves; some have a fourth valve that lowers the pitch by a 4th. The fundamental notes are Eb' and Bb''.

The earliest sousaphones, made to Sousa's specifications in the 1890s, had the bell pointed upright and (as described in Sousa's autobiography, Marching Along, Boston, 1928) 'projected the sound upward and mushroomed it over the entire band and audience'. This model, nicknamed 'the raincatcher', never became popular, though Sousa favoured it; at least one manufacturer (H. N. White of Cleveland, Ohio) advertised 'bell-up' sousaphones as late as 1924. In an interview published in the Christian Science Monitor of 30 August 1922, Sousa recalled that while he was still conductor of the Marine Corps Band (i.e. before August 1892) he suggested the instrument to J. W. Pepper of Philadelphia, who made and named the first sousaphone. The C.G. Conn Co., however, claim to have built the first specimen in 1898. From the early 1960s manufacturers such as Conn and the Selmer Co. constructed sousaphones with fiberglass bodies and brass valves and fittings, resulting in an instrument that is lighter and less susceptible to denting.

-CAROLYN BRYANT

[Spandy]

Also from The New Grove Dictionary Of Music And Musicians

Helicon (Gk. helikon: 'the mountain of the Muses', but apparently confused with helix, 'a coil'; Ger. Helikon). A valved brass instrument made in the same pitches as the military band brass basses in F, Eb and Bb but in circular form. It encircles the player's head, passing beneath the right arm and resting on the left shoulder, and may thus be comfortably carried for long periods by a player on foot or mounted; the usually narrow bell points forwards. The helicon was produced by Ignaz Stowasser, Vienna, in 1845 by some accounts following a suggestion of Wieprecht. An early example by Stowasser, in Bb, is in the Nuremberg Collection (D-Ngm). The instrument has since been made in every European country (rarely in Britain) and is a favourite form of bass in southern and eastern Europe. The SOUSAPHONE is similarly constructed except for the form of its bell.

-ANTHONY C. BAINES

You're all just lucky that I was sitting in a music library while reading this...

[SpartacusRocks]

Also from The New Grove Dictionary Of Music And Musicians

You're all just lucky that I was sitting in a music library while reading this...

Thanks, Spandy. What the world needs is more music libraries! :)

[BariPhynque]

You're all just lucky that I was sitting in a music library while reading this...

Awesome Andy... thanks for taking the time to do this!