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I was watching VP Chaney laying the wreath today in Arlington Cem.

The bugler who "played" taps was not playing! He was taking breaths while notes still sounded and at the end, he put his horn down very smartly but the final note was still sounding.

And while we're at it, I heard the band (sounded great) but I did not see it!
Was that a recording too?

What gives?

Just a wild guess but perhaps the sound was being recorded from a great distance away from the bugler?

I didn't see the broadcast, but maybe this will shed some light:

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techi ... ugle_x.htm

SWOrrior wrote:The camera from Fox News was placed relatively far from the bugler. I thought the situation odd until the camera operator 'zoomed out'; it was certainly placed at a far enough distance to have a time delay.

But I wasn't there.

If the camera was 1100 feet from the bugler, that would cause a roughly 1 second delay.

BVD,

Thanks (sarcasm) for posting a link with the intent of suggesting that the Army Band fakes performances. While there are a shortage of buglers throughout the country, there are NO bugler shortages in Arlington Cemetary--that I guarantee.

The bugler was playing. I would, perhaps, move criticism to the network that broadcast the event, and who apparantly cannot figure out how to sync up their audio and video feeds.

The band is never shown at Tomb ceremonies. I do not know for sure why--I suppose it is either that the camera locations prohibit it, or the news producers simply do not care. The Army Band was present, and the anthem was played live.

Matt Higgins wrote:

BVD Press wrote:I didn't see the broadcast, but maybe this will shed some light:

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techi ... ugle_x.htm

Wow ... that's aboslutely nuts. There is no way it can sound the same. How does this thing work anyway??? Maybe I'm just thinking too hard.

I saw one of these fake bugles in action at a Memorial Day sevice last year. It was being 'played' by either a National Guard soldier or an Army reservist. The sound was thin and 'electronic' sounding. It was a pathetic display... to say the least.

Dean wrote:BVD,

Thanks (sarcasm) for posting a link with the intent of suggesting that the Army Band fakes performances. While there are a shortage of buglers throughout the country, there are NO bugler shortages in Arlington Cemetary--that I guarantee.

I thought the article cleared that up as well:

The armed forces have 500 buglers able to play taps, but 1,800 veterans are dying per day. Only live buglers play the Arlington National Cemetery, the nation's premier burial ground for veterans, but honor guards at other cemeteries have had to scrape to find one.

Tubaryan12 wrote:

Dean wrote:BVD,

Thanks (sarcasm) for posting a link with the intent of suggesting that the Army Band fakes performances. While there are a shortage of buglers throughout the country, there are NO bugler shortages in Arlington Cemetary--that I guarantee.

I thought the article cleared that up as well:

The armed forces have 500 buglers able to play taps, but 1,800 veterans are dying per day. Only live buglers play the Arlington National Cemetery, the nation's premier burial ground for veterans, but honor guards at other cemeteries have had to scrape to find one.

He can discuss this device all he wants, I just dont think it has a place here. Indeed, the article states that Arlington uses live buglers... If the article states this--why post the link here?

Was it BVD's intent to prove that ANC DOESNT use these devices? If so, thanks!!--but, he should have been more clear. For me, the opposite was implied.

Dean wrote:
Was it BVD's intent to prove that ANC DOESNT use these devices? If so, thanks!!--but, he should have been more clear. For me, the opposite was implied.

My only intent was to pass along information that I have read in the past. I was not trying to prove, disprove, imply, have any intent, etc. It was just an article. I am sure there are many more articles written on the subject as well. Probably some interesting Editorials can be found as well!!

Personally, I find the electronic bugle to be an absolute joke. The fact that any military organization would need to use one is even worse.

When someone has served the US and has passed on, we could at least have a live person there to play at their funeral service. Just my opinion.

BVD Press wrote:

Dean wrote:
Was it BVD's intent to prove that ANC DOESNT use these devices? If so, thanks!!--but, he should have been more clear. For me, the opposite was implied.

My only intent was to pass along information

Thanks Bryan,

I think that most of us realize that you were only trying to share info that was in direct response to a legitimate question posted on this board. There was no criticism, sarcasm or anything else in your original response and I am not sure why anyone would imply as much.

I did not see this event, but I do work in broadcast TV.
There can be times, especially during live events, when if
care is not taken, a slight delay in video can happen, two passes through a 8 field frame synchronizer will introduce anywhere from a quarter to half second delay, they do make audio delay units to
match up the audio, but. . . . sometimes things fall by the wayside. Technically, all sorts of things could have happened,
even the new flat panel displays have some lag that can mess
up the viewing experience.

Tuba-G Bass wrote: sometimes things fall by the wayside. Technically, all sorts of things could have happened, even the new flat panel displays have some lag that can mess up the viewing experience.

Not long ago, the local PBS station started to include a quarter-second delay between audio and video in all of their programming. It was so annoying that I couldn't watch without feeling some discomfort, particularly with musical performances. My inquiries to the station only stated that there were "technical problems" that they hoped could be remedied very soon.

Everything sort of looked like a 1950's Japanese monster movie..

Teubonium wrote:I was watching VP Chaney laying the wreath today in Arlington Cem.

The bugler who "played" taps was not playing! He was taking breaths while notes still sounded and at the end, he put his horn down very smartly but the final note was still sounding.

And while we're at it, I heard the band (sounded great) but I did not see it!
Was that a recording too?

What gives?

Arlington National Cemetery NEVER uses recorded music for ANY ceremonies. There are PLENTY of musicians in DC to cover the work. This goes quadruple for jobs involving high dignitaries like the VP.

What you witnessed might make for a great conspiracy, but it is not what happened on location.

As far as the fake bugle, the military is very concious of the sensitivity of that decision and in fact we were sent a memo to not discuss it with the media and instead to refer all questions to a public affairs person at the Pentagon. The basic fact is that there are not enough trumpets employed by the US Army to cover every veteran funeral with a live bugle. They used tape recorded taps over a speaker at some places and it was felt that the speaker in a trumpet bell held by a soldier was better than the play button on a boombox.

To get an idea of just how busy our ceremonial trumpets are playing taps, take a look at the US Army Band Ceremonial Band roster.

* SGM Dennis Edelbrock
* SGM Bram Smith
* MSG Allyn Van Patten *
* MSG Michael Yoder
* MSG David Artley
* MSG James McKenzie
* MSG Karl Mailand
* SFC Michael Cano
* SFC Scott Little
* SFC Paul Klontz
* SFC Christopher Roussey
* SFC Stefen Hinkle
* SFC Todd Taylor
* SSG Michael Jury
* SSG Daniel Lindgren
* SSG Robert Goodner
* SSG Jason Sanders
* SSG Andrew Allphin
* SSG Matthew Tubb

And that is just Ceremonial Band. We also have trumpets in concert band, and the Blues. Ceremonial Band keeps track of the workload for each musician. Even though we have an unusually high percentage of trumpets, they work WAY more than any other section per person.

I have to ask why alto horn, trombone, and euphonium players are not used. I've experimented with taps on those instruments, and it sounded fine to me. It might be a little out of line with tradition, but at least it sure beats the pants off a recording.

To reply to Chuck G's experience with his PBS station, a
quarter of a sevond is 7 or 8 frames off, it could be because of
video and audio compression being used in the signal path.

On the production side there are some good mid-level camcorders
that have a 3-4 frame delay at the time of recording, I personally
hate compression and try to avoid it in my work.

On the subject of Buglers, the director of my trombone choir is
one of several in our area that the Army has issued uniforms to,
and gets severals calls in a month to provide Taps for veterans
burials. A couple of years ago I showed him the clipping of that
fake bugle device, he agreed it was a sad commentary that some
veterans funerals have to resort to such measures.

Just as Lawyers are expected to do a certain amount of pro bono work every year, I think we should expect every professional trumpet player to offer services to the military as a bugler.

Doug "noting that there must be more than 1800 professional trumpet players in the country"

Doug@GT wrote:I think we should expect every professional trumpet player to offer services to the military as a bugler

I think that should be "any brass player that can play bugle reasonably". When I was in high school, I was one of the previously mentioned people that my band director tapped for veteran's funerals. I was impressed by the people I met, and the caring with which they took their responsibilities. Because of that, I, too, did it gratis. Now I can better understand why...

For more information check here:

http://www.tapsbugler.com/

Some really neat info on the history of Taps, etc.

There is an organization called Bugles Across America that exists to provide live buglers for veterans' funerals. I'm considerring joining once the kids are out of the house and I have a little more time.

See http://www.buglesacrossamerica.org/ for more info.

<Edit - See this post for more info as well viewtopic.php?t=11134>

--paul;

pg wrote:There is an organization called Bugles Across America that exists to provide live buglers for veterans' funerals. I'm considerring joining once the kids are out of the house and I have a little more time.

See http://www.buglesacrossamerica.org/ for more info.

--paul;

Cool -- I was just about to post the link myself, but waited until I read through the thread to make sure whether Bugles Across America was already mentioned.

The more publicity, the better -- I hope that word gets about about them. Hopefully more people won't have to resort to a boombox, and more trumpet players will volunteer to cover the funerals.