Hi, does anyone know anything about 19th century “Band music”? I’ve seen a number of mentions of band music regarding certain kinds of flutes, usually the cheaper (albeit very good) flutes I believe. What kind of music would this have been? Would it have been classical music? We can’t say Broadway, nor Jazz obviously ebcause we’re talking about the 19th century. Would we limit band music merely to “military marches”? Any ideas?
Without knowing the contexts of the comments you refer to, one cannot really speculate about what they were referring to. However, on a general basis, I would presume that at any C19th or early C20th use of such a term would almost certainly refer to arrangememnts for Band use, where “Band” would mean military or civilian brass/silver or wind band and possibly flute band (using the “band flute” family of sizes/pitches). The term “Band” would not have referred to anything else prior to the appearance of Jazz…
There was a recent discussion of related matters on Woodenflute in response to a request there by Brian Berryman for flute band arrangements… unfortunately there is no archive of the Woodenflute e-discussion list. I have kept copies of the key contributions but don’t have time right now to edit/compile them - may try to do so if I get a chance some time next week/month…!!! Suffice it to say such material does exist, of course. It would not have been limited to marches - “Band-stand” arrangements of popular items from, say, Opera, etc. would doubtless feature in such repertory.
What? Flutes were banned in the 19th century???
Pat
(sorry, couldn’t resist)
You should have! And perhaps they should have - think how much easier our lives would be! (Only pipes, fiddles and boxes to chose from!)
Nice one 
)
But becoming all serious again, I wonder what kind of music was played?
Do you mean a “flute band” like the bands that were quite popular in Northern Ireland, or the ones that are sort-of analagous to American fife-and-drum corps (it also seems there are a fair number of piccolo bands roaring around Basel during Fasnacht)?
If so, try a Google search on “flute band” – there are a bunch of YouTube videos, etc. (although the video focus is often on the drumming!) as well as some other links to band websites, etc.
Here’s a little description/history of one such band, The Pride of Ballinran:
http://www.geocities.com/prideofballinran/aboutus.html
It seems like most everyone uses high-pitch flutes, fifes or whistles here. However, as I recall, there were also more “sit-down”-type bands comprised of flutes in various pitches in the mid-to-late 1800s, but that’s all I know about them. Anyone?