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Thread: Radical Seating Arrangement

  1. Radical Seating Arrangement

    This year, my band director has decided that we will perform all four movements of Persichetti's "Symphony for Band" and Patrick Conway's march, "The Observing Visitor". It's a wonderful program and fits our band very well, and the symphony has a beautiful euphonium solo in the second movement I get to play. For those that aren't familiar with the Symphony, it is written in "choirs". The idea was that instead of writing melodic material in some sections and harmonic material and backing material in others, the upper woodwinds would be playing one melody while the trombones, tuba, and timpani would be playing another, while the euphoniums and bass clarinets would have their own melodic line of the same importance as the other melodies. My band director is experimenting with exploiting this "choir" system and has put in a seating arrangement I've never heard of. The band is split down the middle between brass and woodwinds, with the more "brassy" of the brass instruments (trombones and trumpets) being further from the woodwinds than the more mellow brasses (euphonium, french horn). The woodwinds have a similar set up in that the flutes and clarinets (more "woodwindy" I guess) are further from the center while the saxes are closer to the brass as they act as a "link" in some parts of the piece between brass and woodwinds. The middle-rear of the band is the mellow lower voices, consisting of the euphoniums, the bass clarinets, the tuba, and the lower trombone parts. The part that strikes people who have seen it is the presence of french horns on the very front row sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with some flute players. I sit in the middle of the band and can't directly hear the balance, but hear the difference between both sides.

    My question to you all is do you think this is a good idea, or is my band director just a tad bit crazy? We have a guest conductor coming soon and he's going to give his opinion on the seating arrangement, but I would also like to hear from other experienced musicians who have performed in more ensembles than I have and might have seen things of this nature.
    Thomann EP 902SL Superior Euphonium

    Eastman Shires ETB432G Trombone

  2. #2
    Seating arrangements are the prerogative of the director. I play in 3 different bands and the seating arrangement is different in all three. I one case, we have changed the seating arrangement 3 times in the last 6 months. (The director is trying to find the best arrangement for the group.) In another case, we play in an outdoor band shell. That seating arrangement has not changed in 50 or more years. Just go with it. You, at the very least, will learn to listen more intently to and for other sections.

  3. #3
    I'm running through the score in my head and I think this could be pretty effective. The caveat is whether musicians adapt to hearing instruments in such unusual places.

    Personally, I tend to be a conductor who seats groups pretty situationally. One of my bands is smaller and has a large trumpet section, so I use a variant of the Sousa Band seating chart with them, which has the WWs on the front right half of the first two rows and the trumpets on the front left half. It works well for balance and no one complains about sitting in front of the trumpets. Low WWs and Brass populate the last two rows. With my larger band, we work in a band room with unusual concrete terraced steps, so we kind of have to wedge ourselves in as best we can. The front and back of the band are pretty standard, the middle is always a work in progress.

    Also, consider why we moved from mono recordings to stereo and surround. Where instruments are on the sound stage does affect how the audience hears the music. In this case, Persichetti's writing really does highlight the different choirs and timbres in the band, so using a spatial dimension to bring that aspect to the audience makes sense to me.

    One of the big jobs a conductor has it to be as clear as possible in delivering the music to the audience. That starts with always assuming that the audience is hearing the music for the first time. We do this with tempo, dynamics, and balance, mainly. For example, a conductor is always mindful about what the foreground layer of the music is because that is what the audience should hear as the foreground, and they'll signal for something to come up or down if the balance isn't reflecting that.

    I guess my broader point is that there are both practical and artistic reasons for a seating change. This might be sacrilege on a forum of brass players, but I'd say trust the conductor. He's got the only set of ears out in front of the band.
    Adrian L. Quince
    Composer, Conductor, Euphoniumist
    www.adrianquince.com

    Kanstul 976 - SM4U

  4. That sounds similar to the usual arrangement for my community band. From left to right, first row is flutes and oboes, second row is clarinets , bassoon and horns, third row is saxes, euphs, trumpets, fourth row is trombones and tuba. All the mellow tenor-range voices effectively sit in a cluster in the middle -- a lot easier for me on euph to tell what the bassoon and tenor sax are up to than in other setups I've been in.
    Dillon 3+1 non-comp euph - Wessex marching baritone - Dynasty DEG G baritone bugle
    Schiller American Heritage Bb/F trombone
    Kanstul Contra Grande G contrabass bugle - Schiller American Heritage 3/4 4V piston BBb tuba

  5. #5
    I would say your band director is more than a little bit crazy, but as I am him I can also say, in retrospect, turns out I was right too! ;-{)}

  6. My only pet peeve as a director, since I direct small bands where seating is not really an issue, is to have the bass drum centered at the back of the band, Sousa style, with the percussion section on one side and the tuba section on the other. Otherwise, whatever the director desires is the way it should be for that particular piece or program.

    Remember that orchestra string sections have had this debate for over three hundred years. Mozart liked to separate the first and second violins across from each other for call-response sections; most contemporary orchestras seat the first violins to the director's left, then the second violins, then viola, then cellos, with basses in the back.

    The one item, as a bandsman, that has never made sense to me: the percussion in one corner, including bass drum, the brass in the back center, including tubas, and the double basses all the way to the other side of the orchestra. How do they keep the beat in phase?

  7. #7
    Join Date
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    Seating can sure vary from one band to the next and is always the prerogative of its MD. In Symphonic Band of the Palm Beaches, the euphs sit to the right of the horns with tubas back row behind the horns. I remember two times when Loras Schissel (Dir. of Virginia Grand Military Band) was guest conductor. He insisted that the tubas be centered in the back row. Mr. Schissel played tuba many years ago. Made sense to me, but the trumpets weren't happy.

    Seems we need to be careful when posting in a public forum about our directors as it could be read by the
    m.
    Rick Floyd
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    "Always play with a good tone, never louder than lovely, never softer than supported." - author unknown.
    Symphonic Band of the Palm Beaches
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