Tamburstock: Its Practical and Aesthetic Functions in Conducting Parade Concerts

Parade concerts occupy a special place in activities of modern military bands. Years of practice show that the most relevant form of the parade concert performance entails two parts: a march parade and a concert section. The bandmaster uses the manual conductor’s technique in the concert section, while a twirling baton is used to manage the band in the march parade, the bandmaster of which is called the drum major or “tamburmajor”.

This article describes the origin and functional particularities of the drum major’s position in the armed forces of Europe and Russia. Throughout the entire period of the position’s existence, the uniform of drum majors has been notable for its splendor, picturesqueness and dress-up severity. Apart from managing the band on the march and training of musicians, other requirements could be imposed on drum majors in the 17th and 18th centuries. Moreover, this article considers the topical issue of a correct term for the tamburstock (twirling baton).

The author puts forward an assumption of a connection between the tamburstock and the battuta: their formal and functional similarity help to determine the most likely time of appearance of the twirling baton — tamburstock. The obvious influence of German music culture on the development of Russian military music since the time of Peter I explains our term “tamburstock” for the twirling baton.

The criteria and methods of using the twirling baton emphasize its importance when conducting a band and express the colorfulness and improvisation features typical for a parade concert. The inclusion of the new “majorettes” genre in the program section of band performances is conditioned by the fact of its active development not only in the United States and Europe, but also in Russia. Due to the operational versatility and widespread demand of the tamburstock in recent decades, there has been an interest in its use by military musical groups of Asian countries.

1. Vandal A. Sochinenie: v 4 t. Napoleon i Aleksandr I. Ot Til’zita do Erfurta [Essay: in 4 Volumes. Napoleon and Alexander I. From Tilsit to Erfurt]. Rostov-on-Don, Feniks Publ., 1995, vol. II, 544 p.

2. Edwards J.J. Regimental Bands, Britanskii soyuznik [British Ally], 1946, no. 31, p. 10 (in Russ.).

3. Arefyev I.V., Tsitsankin V.S. Metodicheskie rekomendatsii po organizatsii i provedeniyu marsh-paradov voennymi orkestrami [Guidelines for Organizing and Conducting March Parades by Military Bands]. Moscow, Voenno-Dirizherskii Fakul’tet pri Moskovskoi Gosudarstvennoi Konservatorii im. P.I. Chaikovskogo Publ., 1987, 52 p.

4. Ozhegov S.I. Tolkovyi slovar’ russkogo yazyka: ok. 100 000 slov, terminov i frazeologicheskikh vyrazhenii [Definition Dictionary of the Russian Language: About 100 000 Words, Terms and Idiomatic Phrases]. Moscow, Oniks Publ., Mir i Obrazovanie Publ., 2012, 736 p.

5. Kuznetsov S.A. (ed.) Bol’shoi tolkovyi slovar’ russkogo yazyka [Unabridged Definition Dictionary of the Russian Language]. St. Petersburg, Norint Publ., 2008, 1536 p.

6. Moskvin A.Yu. (comp.) Bol’shoi slovar’ inostrannykh slov [Unabridged Dictionary of Foreign Adopted Words]. Moscow, Tsentrpoligraf Publ., Polyus Publ., 2003, 816 p.

7. Keldysh Yu.V. (ed.) Muzykal’naya entsiklopediya [Music Encyclopedia]. Moscow, Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya Publ., 1974, 1981, vol. 5, Simon — Kheiler, 1055 column.

8. Kompaneisky N.I. Drum Major, Russkaya muzykal’naya gazeta [Russian Music Newspaper], 1905, no. 48—49, pp. 1188—1189 (in Russ.).

9. Blueprints, Schematics, and Illustrations, Polnoe sobranie zakonov Rossiiskoi imperii. Sobr. 2. T. 36. Otd. 3 [Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire. Coll. 2. Vol. 36. Sec. 3]. St. Petersburg, Tipografiya i Otdelenie Sobstvennoi E. I. V. Kantselyarii Publ., 1863, 1058 p. (in Russ.).

10. Polnoe sobranie zakonov Rossiiskoi Imperii. Sobr. 2. T. 36. Otd. 1 [Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire. Coll. 2. Vol. 36. Sec. 1]. St. Petersburg, Tipografiya i Otdelenie Sobstvennoi E. I. V. Kantselyarii Publ., 1863, 1058 p.

11. Chakmishyan I.G. Rukovodstvo po primeneniyu tamburmazhora pri upravlenii voennym orkestrom v stroyu [Guidelines for the Use of a Drum Major in the Management of a Military Band in the Ranks]. Moscow, Voenno-Dirizherskii Fakul’tet pri Moskovskoi Gosudarstvennoi Konservatorii im. P.I. Chaikovskogo Publ., 1983, 20 p.

12. Mayakin T.K., Shevernev I.V., Kadeev D.V. et al. Metodicheskie rekomendatsii dlya voennykh dirizherov voennykh orkestrov Vooruzhennykh sil Rossiiskoi Federatsii: uchebnoe posobie [Methodological Recommendations for Military Conductors of Military Bands of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation: textbook]. Moscow, 2017, part 1, 52 p.

13. Yurkovets V.V., Khalilov A.M., Tsitsankin V.S. et al. Voenno-orkestrovaya sluzhba: uchebnoe posobie po distsipline [Military Band Service: discipline textbook]. Moscow, Voennyi Universitet Publ., 2007, 216 p.

14. Heine H. Sobranie sochinenii [Collected Works]. St. Petersburg, B.P. Veinberga Publ., 1902, vol. 8, 833 p.

15. Benois A.N. Moi vospominaniya: v 5 kn. [My Memoirs: in 5 books]. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1993, book 1—3, 711 p.

16. Béranger P.-J. de. Polnoe sobranie pesen Beranzhe v perevode russkikh pisatelei [A Complete Collection of Béranger’s Songs Translated by Russian Writers]. Tiflis, K.P. Kozlovskogo Publ., 1893.

17. Bol’shoi anglo-russkii slovar’ ABBYY Lingvo: v 2 t. [Comprehensive English-Russian Dictionary ABBYY Lingvo: in 2 volumes]. Moscow, Russkii Yazyk Media Publ., 2007, vol. 2: L—Z, 1376 p.

18. Fu Qiang. Evropeiskii klarnet i ego funktsionirovanie v khudozhestvennoi kul’ture Kitaya XX — nachala XXI v. [European Clarinet and its Functioning in the Chinese Art of the 20th - Beginning of the 21st Centuries], cand. art. diss. abstr. Minsk, 2017, 24 p.