Snowy Street Music

[Chriss2760]

For the last few years my mates and I have been playing on the streets of our Bavarian-themed town, Leavenworth Washington, on weekends. Most of the year we play German/Bavarian tunes, but we have a Christmas book that we use at this time of year. Glenn Kelly, (on the right playing an Amati English baritone in the video) arranges all of it.

In this piece, Glenn threw "Sing, Sing, Sing" into the middle of "Good King Wenceslas." It looks/sounds like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xt07m4uOtVk" target="_blank" target="_blank

Jeff Phippen and Jerry Dirkse are playing Mirafone baritones.

I'm playing a Yamaha 321 in BBb.

[Carroll]

Very Cool!

[Brown Mule]

Good Job and Merry Christmas

[sinfonian]

Very cool, neet arragnemnt. Merry Christmas

[scottw]

Jeff Phippen and Jerry Dirkse are playing Mirafone baritones.

I'm playing a Yamaha 321 in BBb.

Excellent! That was a fine arrangement, although it's a shame no one seemed to be paying much attention to you.
One question, though: you said that you were playing a Yamaha 321? I distinctly remember that the 321 is a top action horn, whereas the one in the video was front action. Peculiar!

[Chriss2760]

Yeah, my bad.
It's a 621.
Nice catch.

[Walter Webb]

Nice. What's it like to play a large brass instrument in the freezing cold? Does it eventually warm up, or is the mpc and body always cold? Is that an Eb alto horn taking a solo at approx. 2:30? So many questions. Slipping on the ice seems a present danger whilst carrying a tuba.

[imperialbari]

Nice mountain backdrop at the end of the street. Do you have to take it down on windy days?

Klaus

[Chriss2760]

The solo at 2:30 is played by Glenn on his Amati Bb baritone. It's a pea-shooter and sounds very much like like a trombone, which is the sound we were looking for.
Playing outside in the cold is quite a challenge. We were out on the streets all four weekends between Thanksgiving and Christmas this year, and had heavy snow, rain, and icy streets to contend with. (I slipped and fell with the 621 two years ago. That was the subject of another post here.) When the temperature gets below about 25F or so we stuff Hot-Hands chemical hand warmer packets between the tubes at our valves to prevent freezing. Some of the guys use the Kelly lexan mp's, but I use a Sidey SSH (which is stainless steel,) and heats up quickly when playing. The biggest problem is keeping our hands warm while holding the horns.

If anyone's interested, here's the other three this fellow shot:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRncUDwqf0A" target="_blank" target="_blank

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZWyhnmLPyA" target="_blank" target="_blank

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIuKyXktFtk" target="_blank" target="_blank

[tastuba]

They are great arrangements, and the background scenery is sensational. Can only dream of a white Christmas on this side of the world, although our state capital, Hobart, did have snow forecast for the mountain the other day. Might have to add a Northern Hemisphere Christmas to the list of things to do.

Chris, what was the camera man (person?) using to capture the video? I was impressed with the sound available and am in the market for a new handy cam perhaps, and would be keen to get something that was capable of recording sound reasonably well. We had a friend take video on Christmas Day of my family members tackling some of Wade's quartet arrangements on a little hand held device (looked like a phone, but wasn't) and unfortunately it didn't get any of the tuba sound. I appreciate that anything small is possibly going to be limited but any suggestions would be gratefully received.

Cheers
Andrew

PS Any chance the Christmas books are available to purchase?