Brass Bands of the World: Militarism, Colonial Legacies, and Local Music Making.

Hunter, Justin R.

Brass Bands of the World: Militarism, Colonial Legacies, and Local Music Making. Edited by Suzel Ana Reily and Katherine Brucher. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2013. [xx, 246 p. ISBN 9781409444220 (hardcover); ISBN 9781409474210, 9781409444237 (e-book), $109.95.] Music examples, illustrations, bibliography, index.

Brass Bands of the World takes advantage of both archival research and ethnographic accounts to construct histories of a global phenomenon--brass bands--in a historical ethnomusicological framework. Editors Suzel Ana Reily and Katherine Brucher succeed in bringing together disparate places--England, Japan, South Korea, Brazil, the U.S.A., South Africa, Portugal, Northern Ireland, and Mexico--through a shared history of band music and experience by using two key theoretical frameworks: "place and space" and "banding." Framing the book with place and space is quite helpful in stringing together band traditions that have considerable differences in history, circumstance, and function. In the introduction, Reily and Brucher use Michel de Certeau's theories (The Practice of Everyday Life [trans. Steven Rendall; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984]) to understand such ideas and write that "place is constituted by the ordering of elements in a particular location; it is, therefore, a static entity, a reification. Space, on the other hand, comes into being, [de Certeau] claims, through the ways in which it is used and transformed by these uses" (p. 18). Each chapter speaks to these ideas while bringing forward additional ideas mediated through "banding," another useful theoretical frame. This concept, borrowed from Ruth Finnegan (The Hidden Musicians: Music-Making in an English Town [Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2007]), looks not only to musical competencies, but also to the social aspects of a band community. Brass Bands of the World then considers bands as functional spaces through musicking, socialization, and embodiment.

It is difficult to group separate case studies due to differences in historical processes and geographic flows; the editors therefore opt not to use subsections. It is clear, however, that the progression of thought inherently goes from "Europe and the development of die military band prototype to colonial expansion to processes of localization" (p. 27). Subsections emerge with common themes linking chapters together: chapters 1 through 3 explore ideas of nationalism; chapters 4 and 5 look to the complexities of maintaining tradition; chapters 6 and 7 are linked with the idea of place manifested through banding; and chapters 8 and 9 each deal with the mobility of band traditions.

The first subsection, examining themes of nationalism, comprises three chapters. In chapter 1, Trevor Herbert contemplates the idea of "banding" by examining brass and military bands of British origin as "performance domains," which he describes as durable musical entities shaped by their performance practice more than by any linear historical evolution. With that, he contends that since brass and military bands in Britain have had little change in their fundamentals and structure since their inceptions in the nineteenth century, they can be considered emerging in "finished form" (p. 34). Herbert asserts that the conception of military bands in British armies had more to do with artistic patronage by the officer classes than with any notions of military strategy (p. 40) and this led to ceremonial use, a trait later spread throughout the world.

Sarah McClimon, in chapter 2, contends that the history of military bands in Japan was seen as a necessary tool for modernization and a building block for strength in the burgeoning empire. "The Western-style military band in Japan, with its diverse choices of repertoire incorporating Euro-American and Japanese elements, shaped an image of Japan as modern and cosmopolitan, yet rooted in a mythical ancient past" (p. 56). McClimon notes that military music was incorporated by choice rather than through any form of colonization. This allowed Western music and Japanese sensibilities to better marry in a form that suited Japan's efforts to modernize while holding fast to tradition.

Heejin Kim details the importation and appropriation of brass bands based on Western models into South Korea both before and after Japanese occupation and the Korean War. While the other chapters discuss musics direcdy linked to European lineages, chapter 3 shows that music imported to Korea came from both Euro-American and Russian influence. Prior to the Korean War, Russian marches were favored, but during the war, American marches were preferred in South Korea and Russian marches in communist-controlled North Korea. Kim argues that military music has deeper and more long-lasting connections than other musics imported during this time, and that it was military music training that led to a versatile music education system in South Korea.

The next two chapters explore the ideas of maintaining tradition. In chapter 4, Suzel Ana Reily argues that the act of music-king in bands enabled the dissemination of brass bands around the world. She contends that bands' durability allows ensembles to adapt to new situations and fit into niche areas of communities, which in turn allows such bands to survive as "dynamic institutions" that have "continuously responded to the changing circumstances around them" (p. 121). Her case study focuses on the bandas de musica (wind and brass bands) of Brazil, specifically the Minas Gerais region. Here locals cling to a baroque-influenced aesthetic that is maintained in the regional bandas tradition sustained through community involvement.

Chapter 5, on New Orleans brass bands, deals with the complex issue of representation among black community bands in the tradition known as "second line parades." Here, Matt Sakakeeny uses ethnographic materials to highlight one band in particular called the Black Men of Labor (BMOL) and discusses the social issues between different performance groups and their perceived purposes within the larger musical context. He sees the use of "band" as a unifying factor among bandsmen, but that "friction" (Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection [Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005]) is caused between bands with differing views on "tradition." But Sakakeeny suggests "that we assess this friction not only as a sign of antagonistic relations within a musical community, but as a sign of the richness and vitality of the brass band, jazz funeral and second line traditions [in New Orleans]" (p. 137).

The following subsection studies the idea of band as place. In chapter 6, Sylvia Bruinders explores the ways banding serves to "construct alternate social spaces," which she calls "spectacles," for subaltern groups historically not welcomed in pre- and post-apartheid Western Cape, South Africa. She contends that through such activities "colored" or Creole communities find meaning in their lives, as well as feeling a "sense of dignity and respectability denied them by their former oppressors and their still current social and cultural marginalization" (p. 141). While these communities have been social outcasts, neither "black enough" nor "white enough," they remain deeply connected to the place of Western Cape and create strong bonds in faith through the performance of the so-called Christmas band tradition.

In chapter 7, Katherine Brucher discusses the enculturation of shared musical and social values by band members as a localized symbol of Covoes, Portugal. She argues that "on-the-job" training in lessons, rehearsals, and performances develops strong relationships that inform members of their "duties and responsibilities to the ensemble and in turn, where one fits in this [Covoes] community" (p. 175). Similarly constructed to Bruinders's chapter, Brucher examines how the close-knit community built within the amateur wind band experience intrinsically links locals, musicians, and those wanting to be musicians to a strong band tradition.

The book's concluding chapters could be read together as complementary arguments on on types of mobility, and the two groups under discussion each work to define themselves based on, and in spite of, such movements. Gordon Ramsey uses Victor Turner's theories on liminality in pilgrimage and tourism to lay out chapter 8 and his account of the Sir George White Memorial Flute Band of Northern Ireland (while not a "brass band," Ramsey draws connections between other European military band traditions and the flute band). The band takes a yearly "pilgrimage" to Scotland for a series of parades and competitions which constitutes an intense period of musicking, merriment, and fostering of relationships. The pilgrimage, which temporarily displaces the band from its everyday life and place, "contribute[s] to the band's capacity to maintain itself as a functioning ensemble" (pp. 197-98) by strengthening emotional bonds and instilling a sense of pride among the members.

In chapter 9, Helena Simonett details the history of the banda tradition in Sinaloa, Mexico and its various progressions. The local band tradition attempts to reject new influences in this Mexican locale, even though the musical form for which they are known has been globalized through incorporation of new instruments and international record deals. She contends that despite the shifts of globalization, the banda in Sinaloa remains fervent in their choice to stick to traditional roots, despite the potential loss of monetary gains as professional musicians. Thinking back to Reily and Brucher's defining features of place and space, the Sinaloan banda tradition represents a reifying project fixed in place, and through its production, locals remain loyal to the banding tradition in the spaces created by banda.

As is the case with many music studies books from Ashgate Publishing, the lack of musical sources (physical compact disc or online resources) is frustrating. In addition, with the exception of McClimon's chapter, there are no musical notations provided in the text. While this book is obviously written for a broader audience than only musicologists, a few more notated examples would have been helpful in "hearing" these sonic spaces described. While this text limits itself to "brass bands," it takes considerable liberty in the interpretation of the contemporary ensemble, so it seems that some reference to the transition to school bands, specifically marching bands, would have been logical. At several points in the book the authors allude to connections with school inarching ensembles, but none directly discuss them. Music education scholars would have had great interest in such connections, but unfortunately, the book stops just short of these efforts. Furthermore, it seems odd that a chapter on drum and bugle corps (e.g.. Drum Corps International) was left out of the final product, since these ensembles are closely related to ensembles discussed throughout the text and have become a worldwide, respected musical sport.

Overall, the book is quite useful in understanding the dissemination and localization of brass and military bands around the world. It is a well-constructed and intriguing read for anyone interested in histories of bands, but more generally it would be of interest to anyone researching colonial music history, military music history, cross-cultural musical studies, or the spread of "band music" from Europe outwards.

JUSTIN R. HUNTER

University of Hawai'i at Manoa