LESSON #3

New Orleans

Brass Band Style

This lesson supports the following GOALS:

[Goal #1] Students will gain an appreciation of traditional jazz and the continuing value of this music.

[Goal #2] Students will become acquainted with the variety of styles within the traditional jazz genre, and with some of its major figures.

[Goal #4] Students will play traditional jazz.

This lesson supports the following OBJECTIVES:

1.1  Students will become acquainted with what well-played traditional jazz sounds like.

2.3  Students will become acquainted with what a traditional New Orleans brass band sounds like.

2.4  Students will become acquainted with the social function of the brass band in New Orleans.

2.5  Students will become acquainted with the role of brass bands in the genesis of jazz.

4.1  Students will learn how to play from a lead sheet.

4.2  Students will rehearse a tune in the New Orleans Brass Band Style.

 

RATIONALE: The brass band sound is at the heart and soul of traditional jazz, and students will enjoy creating this sound.

NATIONAL STANDARDS SUPPORTED: See Appendix C.

KIT COMPONENTS:

■ Style Guide

■ Audio: Track 2, “Just a Little While to Stay Here” by Eureka Brass Band

■ Music: “Hindustan” (lead sheet)

 

The Olympia Brass Band

ACTIVITY (app. 35 minutes):

1. Prepare the students for the audio track by sharing the elements of the New Orleans Brass Band Style as outlined in the Style Guide, and briefly expanding on the background presented in the brass band segment of the video in Lesson #1. (app. 10 minutes)  Share with the students the following points (in your own words):

 • Brass bands served as the initial crucible for the emerging music called jazz.  Around the turn of the 20th century, brass band musicians began departing from written scores, improvising their own melodic and rhythmic variations.

 • The brass bands played (and still play) for funeral parades in New Orleans, accompanying the body to the cemetery with solemn hymns, and breaking into joyous jazz on the way back, celebrating the afterlife of the deceased.

 • These parades are accompanied by people dancing in the street to the sound of the band; these celebrants are called the “second line”.

 • The brass band tradition remains strong in New Orleans today, and is practiced elsewhere in the world as well.

 • There are also brass bands that play contemporary jazz using the traditional brass band instrumentation.

 • While listening to this audio track, students should listen for the characteristic polyphony (several improvised melodic lines played simultaneously). They should also key into the raw emotion of the musicians’ playing.

 • “Just a Little While to Stay Here” is a traditional hymn commonly played by jazz style brass bands in New Orleans.

2. Play the online audio track, “Just a Little While to Stay Here” by the Eureka Brass Band, at high volume (app. 5 minutes).  Have the students imagine as they listen that they are on a street in the French Quarter, surrounded by a throng of people joyously second-lining.

3. Discuss with the students their impressions of the audio track (app. 5 minutes).  Are they able to feel the joy?  How many of the described stylistic elements were they able to hear?  (See accompanying table)

4. As necessary: Explain to the students how to interpret a lead sheet (transposition, chord symbols, bass line, etc.) (app. 5 minutes).

5. Print out the “Hindustan” lead sheet for your students. Rehearse “Hindustan” in a brass band style using the lead sheet, and applying the stylistic elements heard on the recording (app. 10 minutes).

 Instrumentation considerations:

 • Use separate snare and bass drum if possible

 • Add saxes, additional brass

 • Piano and banjo/guitar sit this one out

 • Use sousaphone (or tuba) if possible

 • Trumpeters should trade off the lead

Start by having one instrument play the melody for all to hear; then set up the drum beat (notated below).  Have one trumpeter play melody once with drums and sousaphone; then everyone (several choruses, with horns improvising counter-melodies).  The performance should end on “beat three” (drums can keep going, as in a real parade).  Common ending phrases found in this style (played by the trumpets/cornets) include those notated below in Concert Bb.

 

Brass Band Drum Beat:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Brass Band Ending Phrases (trumpet/cornet):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EVALUATION:  Do the students understand the sound and function of the New Orleans brass band?  Were they able to create that kind of sound with their instruments?

Stylistic Elements Chart:

Brass Band Style

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The students should be able to hear elements of the style approximately as outlined above.  These are subjective judgements; allow for disagreements.

ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES:  Encourage the students to explore some of the additional brass band recordings cited in the Style Guide.