Change of Instrumentation - 2000 National Finals

---

Just wondering if you had heard that the N.B.B.A. has decided that the National Finals at the Albert Hall, will take on a new-look this year, and that all section test-pieces will contain movements requiring strings, woodwind, a piano accordion, harmonica and that percussionists will only be allowed a bass drum. In the top section there will be a passage requiring the solo euph to play an Ophicleide ! How on earth is a band going to obtain one of these instruments ? And in the fourth section contest all bands will have to have a Hosaphone and the test piece will contain top C sharps for third and second cornets. Surely this is going too far. Could it lead to the end of the brass band movement as we know it ? I envisage a big protest.

Posting to the brass band mailing list by David Williams on Saturday 1st April 2000