Palmyra Eagle Community Band Blog

PECB Band 2011 Schedule

2011-05-02T08:21:00.000-07:00

Band members should have a 2011 schedule from practice. If you do not ask Mike Rubingh for one at practice, or consult the image above.

Some of PECB Wed Mar 24 Concert pieces

2010-03-22T16:04:00.000-07:00

Band Members...

Here's some listening samples for the 3-24 concert thanks to various music publishing sites. All use the arranger in our publications.

All Things Bright and Beautiful

Ave Verum

Hymn for a Child

Lead on O King Eternal

Procession of the Nobles

Sarabande

-Mike R.

Tips - Finding band music clips online

2010-02-10T15:28:00.000-08:00

You like to listen to a tough musical section to get the rhythm. Or hear varying tempos for a piece of music. Or want an audio memory of the song to aid in practice. In all these cases having a CD or musical clip of a piece of music can be a good way to get a feel for the organic whole of a piece of music that still feels disjointed and fragmented during sight-reading and early practice.

The internet is a great resource for finding relatively obscure pieces of music, and many music publishers will attach a music sample to help sell their scores. What follows are some of my tips for music hunting online.

(1) Google is your friend. Simply typing some keywords from the song title plus the arranger last name will usually locate the official sellers of the music selection, and sometimes an accompanying audio clip or even full mp3. Some publishers will require clicking an agreement not to copy, distribute, or otherwise publish the selection, of course, but usually there is no fee and no log in requirement.

(2) Youtube will sometimes provide a decent version of a popular music piece even if it is not the exact concert band version you are using. 'Parade of the Charioteers' has a nice youtube clip or two for instance, as do a lot of holiday selections.

(2) The publisher is usually listed on the upper left of a music piece, so a search for that publisher--e.g. 'Queenwood', or 'Hal Leonard'--will often be fruitful. For example, Queenwood published Thats a Plenty, Themes Like Old Times, and Fidgety Feet, and the first two of these are at http://www.queenwood.com/cbseries7.php

(3) Google will usually find you many 'Free Mp3' sites that provide a wide range of music , but these usually require some kind of sign-up or login, or payment (after which everything is 'free'). It is better just to skip these because of the frustration they can cause, unless you are willing to jump through the hoops involved (i.e. you think it's a good collection of music to have access to). Likewise, you may find torrent versions of songs/albums that are perfectly good downloads, but illegal. These are best avoided.

(4) Instead, go for serious names in music publishing business, since the larger outfits can afford websites with audio clips, and better, they actually may be the arranger/version that the community band is playing. Some of the big names are:

http://www.jwpepper.com
http://www.schirmer.com
http://www.alfred-music.com
http://www.barnhouse.com

Below are a few selections for the Fat Tuesday concert I found online with very little work. Has anyone located the ones I couldn't find? What are your tricks for finding musical selections online?

Mike R.

Clarinet Marmalade (Queenwood.com)

Cool Blues for Trombones (Alfred Music

Just a Closer Walk With Thee (JWPepper.com)

Can Can You Name These Tunes? (Barnhouse.com)

Thats a Plenty (Queenwood.com)

Where We Are

2010-01-29T13:43:00.001-08:00

View Larger Map

The PECB Community Band practices every 7pm at the band room of the Palmyra Eagle high school, shown above. You can click the above map to expand to see local streets or shrink to see our relation to Eagle, Whitewater, East Troy, etc.

-MJR

2010-01-18T13:05:00.000-08:00

To all PECB Band Members:

A blog like this is a kind of online discussion group, posting area similar to email but public, place to share band pictures, videos, and other band documents that can be shared in public. It allows readers to easily make comments to postings. All PECB band members can post to this blog. The blog id is 'pecbband'. To get the password to login and enable you to post please contact Mike Rubingh at pecbband@gmail.com or at band practice. I will also share the login id and password with the full band at practice once band starts up again in Feb 2010.

Creating a blog post is similar to creating an email, and the interface also allows pictures and videos to be added. Blogs unfortunately do not allow documents to be directly attached to posts like email, but I've also created an account for the PECB at Scribd.com, a site that allows documents to be uploaded, then linked to by blogs, so we can share MS-Word documents, PDF files, txt files etc, if that is desirable for centralizing band documents long-term. The Scribd id and password are the same as used for the blog.

Mike R.
pecbband@gmail.com
mikerubingh@gmail.com

2010-01-18T12:50:00.001-08:00

Welcome to the Palmyra-Eagle Community Band blog. The Palmyra-Eagle community band is a community musical group with members from Palmyra and Eagle, Wisconsin, as well as surrounding towns. The band is directed by Mr. Ed Pierce. The PECB performs free public concerts in Eagle, Palmyra, and surrounding areas of Wisconsin, with venues including parks, churches, retirement homes, parades, and other community events. The PECB practices weekly at the Palmyra-Eagle High School band room, Mondays at 7pm, and welcomes all those who own a musical instrument and enjoy playing in a group.

In January, band members created a website located at the url pecb.info. This blog is an accompaniment to that website, and allows band members to view and publish comments, pictures, and more day-to-day band specific information than the website allows.