When I was but a kid my crazy memory had already started to develop its retention skills...and one particular poem...or recitation....had a defining part to play in my upbringing...
I stood up, throughout my childhood, to participate in a great many Salvation Army festivals...sometimes as a singer, most often as a euphonium soloist...but I also got asked, from time to time, to recite poems! One about two frogs in danger of drowning in a milk churn comes to mind (but they kept on paddling and eventually turned it to butter and climbed out - the moral, never give up!), another about a lady in church who sat amongst the 'bad boys' on the back row...and one poem, in particular, came to mind this evening. Called 'The Critic' I must have recited it dozens of times...I even recall once singing it to the tune of 'Paddy McGinty's Goat'!
I'd guess it's out of copyright by now so here it is:
"He was sitting in the gallery, a-listening to the band
He thought himself a crictic and was feeling mighty grand,
As he loudly made his comments, so that all around could hear,
He made himself a 'perfect pest' to people sitting near:
"The cornets, they were terrible, their tone was really rough.
The basses couldn't do a thing, there wasn't half enough!
The trombones and euphoniums were ragged as can be,
The drums were poor, the flugel worse -
The drums were poor, the flugel worse -
The horns played horribly!
The baritones were dreadful; the BM didn't seem
To get the men to follow like a good and balanced team."
Well, he counted up the errors and he didn't miss a fault
And so he carried on until a small boy called a halt.
"Excuse me, guv," the boy remarked, "You seem to 'ave it wrong!
This meeting ain't a contest - that ain't why they've come along.
These men 'ave got a message - it's an old 'un but it's true -
There ain't a band wot's playin' that could please the likes of you!
"That man what plays the monstre*, he's me father, do you 'ear?
He used to come 'ome sozzled and would sell me boots for beer
But 'The Army' went and found 'im, 'e got saved! I'm proud to say
'E's now the finest father - and I likes to 'ear 'im play!
"Now others in the band are 'toffs' and never 'ave been poor,
They love to play the music and they no what bands are for!
So don't sit criticising the good old Army band -
Just fink of all the good they do - My! Ain't that playin' grand?"
It's the difference between an 'Army' band existing for the reasons it does and the raison d'etre of an 'outside' band (as they are still referred today by Salvationists) that perhaps is highlighted most in the poem. 'Outside' - or contesting - bands compete frequently against each other...you only have to watch 'Brassed Off' to experience some of the competitive nature! I don't know if they still do this but the adjudicators used to sit behind a curtain and listen to each band's rendition of the 'test piece', making their comments - their critical appraisals - and, ultimately, deciding the order in which the bands would finish in the contest.
I only ever went to the Royal Albert Hall once for a contest - the testpiece was the 'easy listening' favourite 'Blitz' by Derek Bourgeois. I sat and listened to this atonal piece of programme music some twenty-odd times and vowed never to do it again! (I quite like the piece now but it was not my cup of tea as a teenager and it took a long time for me to forgive it!)
Yet the pretence of the curtain I found the most ridiculous thing...could the experienced adjudicator really not tell it was Black Dyke playing when the cornet solo was played by the familiar tone of Philip McCann? Even I could tell his sound a mile off! I remember the first time we watched the wonderful Patricia Routledge detective series 'Hetty Wainthropp Investigates' on TV for the first time - the theme music started and my dad and I both said 'That's Philip McCann' within a couple of notes. Surely the 'professional' could recognise all the bands without seeing them!
That's where criticism has its place, of course - and very much rightly so. 'Army' bands don't compete (and, as mentioned above) exist for an entirely different reason..but we like to do the best we can. Having played in a Salvation Army band now for some 37 years (man and boy) I like to think that the best of SA bands could hold their own with the best of the contesting bands - but I have no desire to ever see them have that opportunity...and neither would they!
So sit up in the gallery a-listening to the band...but enjoy the music - thank God for it if that's your 'thing' - but criticise at your peril! That young boy might be in the row in front...and you wouldn't want his sozzled dad to still be selling his boots, would you?
*the 'monstre' is the monster-bass - a BBb tuba some 5' or more high
Having sat professionally on both sides of the fence I have to say that there are no SA ISB included bands that could hold there own with the very best of the best "Outside" bands. The SA sound is just different and rightly so. Nothing can compare to the ISB playing Elsa or Enfield playing Light of the World. However the top bands now are virtually professional (with the lack of direct payment being the only difference). Their two rehearsals a week under the finest conductors just doesn't compare with even the best SA Bands. The best English, Dutch, Norwegian bands are just phenomenal. I believe that repertoire also has a lot to say. Army bands just sound different.
ReplyDeleteoh my word..... I used to recite that too!!! I'm quite scared by the fact that I could remember every word as I read it here. Although the pedant in me thinks it might be 'farver'?? Or was that my mothers painstaking coaching??!! ;-)
ReplyDeleteNo...I thought so too! I did it from memory...the punctuation and dropped consonant apostrophes are all guessed...I just didn't want to explain...international readership and all that you know, lol ;o)
ReplyDeleteWent to a few band contests at the end of the 70s. Quite a marathon to listen to a 15 minute piece 20 times, especially if it was a 'duffer'. Fortunately the first piece I heard in that context was 'Checkmate' by Arthur Bliss. A superb piece of music,thrilling stuff! But you're right Marc, the adjudicators must have known when Dyke played, and others by the distinctive tone of one or two of their players. They certainly would know which the 'lesser' bands were by the racket made as half the Royal Albert Hall upped and left almost as one for the bar / toilet etc just before they started playing!!
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