We’ve just finished with the carnival parades but the next parade is just around the corner here in the Southwest of Germany: In March there is the “Sommertagszug” (summer day’s parade) in our town and other towns in the vicinity, it is very much a local event. And of course, no parade without a marching band.
Although they look more like a strolling band.
I am not a big fan of traditional brass bands so I usually avoid the fest tents at the smaller festivals in the area. The bigger festivals have more tents and cater to different music tastes. But they were selling sausages at the local winegrowers’ festival and we were hungry, so we went in.
We were very surprised by the band on the stage. They looked spiffy but not completely different to the more traditional bands. Their music was wonderful, upbeat and boisterous. They were having a lot of fun.
So were we.
I’m not a musically educated person but I think technically this band is not a brass band as they also have woodwinds. We call such formations Blaskapelle in Germany. But whatever their classification, they are part of German traditional festivities.
pictures imperfect blog 