Foden's soprano star Alan Wycherley has expressed his growing concern to 4BR about what he believes is a current trend in modern day test pieces towards writing for the very extremes of the instrument.

Issue

Just a couple of days before he takes to the stage to play the exceptionally difficult soprano part in Hermann Pallhuber's 'Titan's Progress', his thoughts are sure to bring the issue to the fore.

The piece itself contains writing that sees the soprano peak at a top E above top C, and Alan thinks this may herald a desire in certain compositional quarters for the piccolo trumpet to be used in banding in future.

Direction

Speaking personally in an exclusive interview to 4BR Alan said: "I'm just a bit concerned as to which direction composers are going at the moment regarding the role of the soprano in a brass band."

"If we go back 30 years a top C was fairly rare and in the past 30 years they have got to be the norm. Certain composers have pushed the bar up a little by going up to the odd C# and even the occasional top D, but now all I seem to see at times is ever higher and ever louder requirements – writing that has more in common with piccolo playing than traditional soprano playing."

A good composer can test any soprano player within a reasonable range without just seeing how high they can go, so I don’t see the need to try send the soprano in extinctionAlan Wycherley

Ignored

Even though Alan fully understands the desire to test players, he feels that the true strengths of the soprano cornet are being ignored.

He added: "Whilst I fully understand the benefit of ‘pushing’ players to the limit I am also a little worried that composers now want to go even higher – there is a top E and E flat in this years Open piece for instance.

"I think that quite a few players will just take different mouthpieces on stage to get these notes, but I wonder is it time to ask composers what they really want, and if they really understand just what a soprano cornet can do to the tone and colour of a brass band?"

Out of control

Alan hopes though that the current trend doesn’t get out of control.

"If they want another octave above the cornet parts then why not just introduce the Piccolo into contesting and either do away with the soprano or allow the players to take on two separate instruments to play the parts?”

"A good composer can test any soprano player within a reasonable range without just seeing how high they can go, so I don’t see the need to try send the soprano in extinction – it is a wonderful instrument in its own right."