The Black Dyke Band are one of the worlds most celebrated and illustrious Brass bands. Established over 150 years ago they have a history like no other, with a myriad of awards, achievements, and accomplishments under their proverbial belt. One struggles to select just a handful of such examples when there really are so many to choose from. But to give you a flavour, their affiliation with The Beatles is a nice place to start. They recorded an instrumental version of ‘Yellow Submarine’ for The Beatles in 1968 which was later used as a b-side for one of the bands famous singles. They later worked with McCartney on a track for the Wings album Back to the Egg in 1979. Furthermore, their collaborative work with international superstars doesn’t stop there either – the band have also recorded with Peter Gabriel, Tori Amos and The Beautiful South.
Above: The Black Dyke band in their new rehearsal room. They use The Opus 1 musician posture chair, and RAT Concert stands. All available from Amadeus.
When opting to reside in slightly less Rock ‘n’ Roll but equally prestigious circles, they still find time to tour the world collecting cabinets full of trophy’s and awards along the way. Black Dyke was the first band to achieve the "Grand Slam" in 1985 by winning the Yorkshire regional, European, British Open and National Championship contests. They were also voted BBC Band of the Year. In August 2009, the band undertook a tour of Australia with multi-instrumentalist James Morrison which culminated in a concert at the Sydney Opera House.
They are lead by the charismatic Nicholas Childs DMA, MA, FLCM, ARCM (Hons), whose CV boasts success of monumental proportions. For more on Nicholas Childs & The Black Dyke Band take a look at their website: http://www.blackdykeband.co.uk/1/
Above: Dr Nicholas Childs DMA, MA, FLCM, ARCM (Hons)
Back in April 2007 Amadeus Acoustic Solutions were invited by Dr Nicholas Childs to visit the historical Black Dyke Band Headquarters, and assess the dubious acoustics within the new rehearsal space.
John Locke of Amadeus under took this initial mission and travelled to meet Dr Childs and visit the band room. John briefed our acoustic consultant taking full account of the proposed plans and worked in collaboration with the project architect. It was determined that we were faced with a difficult task – considering the size of the band, and the fundamental nature of the brass instruments, the new band room was less than half the size of that which we would recommend/design for acoustic purposes. Nonetheless, seldom are we presented with a set of ideal circumstances, and resolving a problem such as this is exactly what we do best.
By strategic placement of acoustic absorption panels around the practice room to reduce the Reverberation Time (RT) from 3 seconds down to just over 1 second.
The work was eventually carried out in March 2010, and the rehearsal room works well and looks very impressive. When we carry out an installation such as this we place equal importance on both the acoustic effectiveness of the treatment, and the aesthetic appearance of the interior design. As you will see from the pictures above and below, the installation looks wonderful. We discussed and consulted the colour scheme of the panels with our client in order to achieve an overall 'feel' that suited the band and the room itself. The perfect finishing touch was provided by printing The Black Dyke Band logo on two of the panels, which we all thought looked stunning.
The technical stuff:
A combination of acoustic panel types, dimensions and positions were established to give as near optimum performance as space and budget would allow. The variety of images show fabric covered Absorbors ™ & B.A.D’s ™ these would ensure an RT of around 1 second at mid and high frequencies and 25% more at low frequencies. The band room was used for the first time as recently as July 2010 and proved to be a great success.
Above: The Amadeus Opus 1 musician posture chair. As used by the Black Dyke Band. This particular chair was custom made by Amadeus for the Black Dyke band and is covered in a beautiful red leather.
For more information on acoustic treatment, acoustic panels, printed acoustic panels, music stands or posture chairs please visit www.amadeus-equipment.co.uk, or contact us: info@amadeus-equipment.co.uk
NB: All photos by Emily Crane.
