Dave Payn
Active Member
Having purchased another brass band recording which contains this track and as a keen Harry James fan, (note: not an 'expert', just a fan!) I've always been puzzled as to why so many bands take this at comparatively breakneck speed when the original Harry James recordings are nothing of the sort. Fairey's, on their album, Skyliner, is the only recording which for me, comes close in, in my humble opinion, tempo and style. (a quick 'blues 4' rather than an almost march tempo 2 as I've heard on other recordings) Any other views on this?
I can think of a similar analogy with Widor's famous Toccata from his Symphony no. 5. Having heard so may 'wham bam, thank you ma'am' performances from great organists, I then heard a recording of Charles-Marie Widor playing it himself at a much slower speed and the amount of detail I'd heard which hadn't come to me before was amazing - even in a transfer of an old recording (Widor died in 1937). It could have been, of course, that Widor wan't capable of playing it so fast, but I doubt it, really!
Don't wish to sound like a know-all, I'm nothing of the sort. Just an honest opinion. Comments welcome.
Regards
I can think of a similar analogy with Widor's famous Toccata from his Symphony no. 5. Having heard so may 'wham bam, thank you ma'am' performances from great organists, I then heard a recording of Charles-Marie Widor playing it himself at a much slower speed and the amount of detail I'd heard which hadn't come to me before was amazing - even in a transfer of an old recording (Widor died in 1937). It could have been, of course, that Widor wan't capable of playing it so fast, but I doubt it, really!
Don't wish to sound like a know-all, I'm nothing of the sort. Just an honest opinion. Comments welcome.
Regards