Brassed Off Calendar Girls do the Full Monty in Camelot (1/?)
Merlin clutched Gloria, carefully stowed away in her hand-painted, purple-and-gold instrument case, and inhaled the foggy Yorkshire air.
Yorkshire!
Stoical, no-nonsense Yorkshire, spiritual home of the brass band movement, and mother to four of the top ten brass bands in the world - one of which, Albion Brass Band Amateurs (ABBA for short), last year’s national champions, had just extended an invitation to Merlin Emrys to fill their newly-vacant flugelhorn chair.
A permanent broad grin had plastered itself all over his face ever since Uncle Gaius had called him with the news. He’d managed to secure a transfer to Camelot University, based in the same scruffy industrial town as the band, to finish his physiotherapy course.
And here he was at his first rehearsal. He eyed the band-room door. It had “ABBA” crudely stencilled on it in gold letters. He immediately felt at home.
An insanely good-looking bloke with just-out-of-bed hair, artfully dishevelled goatee and a roguish grin, walked up to the band-room door. He was clutching a large instrument case, which sported a sticker that proclaimed ‘Brass players do it with their lips, fingers and tongues’. In his other hand a smaller instrument case stated proudly “I’ll blow your horn if you'll blow mine”.
Merlin held the door open with an appreciative smile as this walking advertisement for male hair product clattered through. He’d known he was going to enjoy the sound effects, playing brass in Yorkshire, but not that the scenery was going to be so decorative.
‘Well hello!’ the man greeted him with a flirtatious leer at Merlin’s spare frame. ‘I’m Gwaine. First Baritone. My horn is looking forward to playing with yours already.’ And he leaned in close, crowding Merlin’s personal space.
‘Merlin,’ he replied, blushing furiously at Gwaine’s shameless flirting. He held Gloria, still hidden away in her case, high in front of him as a protective shield. “F….f…. flugel,”
“Gwaine, stop frightening the new recruit,” said a melodious female voice. As Merlin entered the band room a dark-eyed, dimple-smiled woman came towards him, all tumbling ringlets. She extended a hand.
“I’m Gwen. Please ignore Gwaine,” she warned, leaning in conspiratorially and talking in a loud whisper. ”He’s even more disreputable than he looks. Rumour has it he’s contagious. Try not to go too near him.”
“Oi!” Gwaine protested, mock-hurt. “I am here, you know, hearing intact.”
Merlin laughed, just as three pretty women entered the room. They sent him curious glances as they walked through the door, each carrying a lurid pink trombone case. The cases were labelled “Bone 1”, “Bone 2” and “Bass Bone”.
“Evening Sophia, hi Elena, hi Mithian,” leered Gwaine. “Busy later ladies? Because I am going to be WIDE awake after this rehearsal and would love some company to help lull me to sleep, you know what I mean?” The three girls rolled their eyes in comical unison and one of them, a blond girl with perfectly manicured fingernails, made an obscene gesture with the middle finger of her free hand.
“Swivel on this, matey,” she said without rancour, and Gwaine and the other trombone players laughed.
Right, thought Merlin. Clearly this band has a robust and forthright attitude towards unwelcome advances, and the fending off thereof. Not that advances from Gwaine would necessarily be unwelcome, he amended hastily.
He sat on the chair Gwen indicated as the band room filled up. Albion band was arranged with the flugelhorn player facing the principal cornet; the conductor stood between the two. Gwen settled in the principal cornet chair, so she was sitting right opposite Merlin, smiling reassuringly. Shortly afterwards a stunningly gorgeous, dark-eyed man settled next to Merlin, clutching a tenor-horn. He introduced himself as Lance, solo horn, and proceeded to gaze longingly at Gwen.
Merlin sighed inwardly. Clearly he wasn’t going to have any luck with Lance. Not that he was here to pull. Obviously. He carefully drew Gloria out of her case. Lance glanced at her.
"Wow, mate, never seen a flugelhorn that colour before!"
"Glorious, isn't she?" said Merlin proudly.
"My horn would go that colour if Merlin touched it with his lips, too," leered Gwaine. Merlin and Lance laughed.
Merlin smiled and waved when Uncle Gaius came in and sat in the principal euphonium chair. Gaius arched an eyebrow in reply. Behind him, Merlin was surprised to see Freya settle down, hiding behind a tuba. He hadn’t known that Freya was in the band, nor that she would feel comfortable in such a crowded room. He lifted his hand in a wave, and she stared at him, a little shocked to see him out of context before returning a shy smile.
But there was no time to chat. The remaining players had been filing in, and the band room was nearly full, with only the assistant principal’s chair vacant. The players were busy oiling valves, greasing tuning slides, inserting mouthpieces and blowing warm air into their instruments as the conductor, an Asian man of indeterminate age with a dark grey beard, fierce eyebrows and a wrinkly bald pate, entered the room. He was followed by a stern-faced older man, who had a weary air of command, and a scar on his forehead.
At that moment Merlin could have sworn that the lights dimmed and violins started to play as a golden-haired, golden-skinned Adonis thrust through the door, fleshy pink lips drawn up into a sarcastic sneer, jaw hewn by legions of skilled chisel-wielders, expensive t-shirt clinging to finely honed pectorals.
Merlin’s jaw dropped and he flushed to the roots of his hair. He hastily moved Gloria onto his lap, and resisted the temptation to curve his neck round to check out the bloke’s arse.
The blond carried on a hissed conversation with the older, scar-faced man who had preceded him. Mid-sentence he caught Merlin gazing at him, and smirked. If his lip had curled up any further it’d have been half way up his right nostril. Merlin caught the words and “classically trained, better things to do” and instantly bristled.
Right, thought Merlin. Obviously Blondie, as well as being a perfect physical specimen, is a fully-paid-up elitist orchestral-music Mafioso come to look down his nose at the working-class brass-playing fraternity. Fuck ‘im. Protective hackles rose.
Merlin squashed his treacherous libido, which was urging him to smile ‘come hither’, and instead scowled at the gorgeous, privileged, posh, blond bastard, now permanently dubbed “Blondie” in his head. Assigning this moniker to the git was an affront to his beloved Debbie Harry, but he couldn’t think of anything better to call the bastard at this point. Blondie returned the scowl with a venomous leer, and made his way to the assistant principal cornet seat next to Gwen.
The scar-faced older bloke who’d come in with Blondie coughed and all 30 players fell silent.
“Good evening ladies and gentlemen. To those of you that don’t know me, let me introduce myself; I am Uther Pendragon, Chairman of this band and CEO of your sponsors, Camelot Coal. Welcome to the band.
“I have some… unfortunate… news for you. A number of players and our conductor, Morgana Le Fay, hearing of the financial crisis at Camelot Coal, have resigned in anticipation that this crisis may negatively affect the band’s viability. We suspect that Morgause has lured them to join Mercia Mills Band. As you know this will cause some problems for us as we prepare for the Yorkshire Area Contest which is in only 3 months’ time.”
Cat-calls and boos, rapidly ssshed. Uther frowned.
“However, we are very fortunate to have been able to source, at short notice, an excellent flugelhorn player to replace Viviane; Gaius’s nephew Merlin has recently moved here from Ealdor, where he played flugel for Irish national champions Ealdor Silver Band. Please extend a warm welcome to him.”
Cheers and claps at this, and a wolf-whistle from Gwaine. Merlin grinned self-consciously as he acknowledged his applause. Lance clapped him on the back - he nearly overbalanced but managed to restore himself in time to look directly into Blondie’s amused eyes. While no-one was looking, Blondie winked at him and Merlin suppressed a smile, despite himself. Uther cleared his throat and continued.
“*Ahem* … in view of Morgana’s …*ahem*… somewhat precipitous departure, we have appointed the distinguished Dr Kahill Garah as Musical Director.”
Polite applause as the Asian gentleman bowed, eyebrows rising, pate wrinkling.
“My son, Arthur, who is a professional classical trumpeter, recently graduated from the Royal College of Music, will be joining you as a replacement for Niniane.”
Arthur had a plain black, but very expensive-looking, gig bag, labelled “Excalibur” in gold lettering, from which he withdrew a top-of-the-range, lovingly-polished trumpet. It stood out from the nest of cornets like a sore, brassy thumb. Several bandsmen frowned. Merlin snorted.
“What kind of an arse brings a trumpet to a brass band rehearsal?” Merlin muttered at Lance, loudly enough for Arthur to overhear. Lance shrugged and shook his head.
Hearing this, Arthur’s eyes narrowed. His gaze bore into Merlin as if he was a cockroach, to be pinned into a beetle collection, in order to complete a range of more attractive and interesting, but equally dead beetles.
“Arthur has not had an opportunity to work with a brass band before,” Uther continued. “As a former cornet player myself, I am delighted that he is doing so now.” Uther stood down and gestured to Gwaine, who stood and extracted an old but serviceable Besson cornet from his shabby-looking second instrument case and walked over to Arthur with it.
“Here you go Princess,” said Gwaine, winking at Arthur. “We can’t make beautiful music together with a horn that shape,” he nodded at Excalibur and nudged Arthur with a leer. “You’ll be needing one of these instead. She’s a right lovely blow, is Cinderella here, with her Vincent Bach mouthpiece nestling snugly in her tight little hole…”
“Gwaine!” hissed Gwen indignantly. “Juniors present!” Merlin saw that a spotty-faced teenage boy, seated at the far end of the third cornet desk, was listening to Gwaine with wide-eyed interest.
“What? I didn’t say anything!” professed Gwaine, with innocent puppy-dog eyes. Merlin snorted as a titter rippled round the band room.
Arthur took the cornet with a suspicious sneer, but replaced Excalibur carefully in its case and picked up Cinderella.
Meanwhile Uther resumed his speech, exhorting the band to do their best for the new conductor and to beat Mercia Mills at the area contest at all costs. “Are there any questions?”
The soprano cornet player, clearly visible behind Gwen by virtue of his towering height, raised his hand timidly.
“Yes, Percival?”
“Excuse me Mr Pendragon. Does this financial crisis mean we won’t be able to afford a new soprano cornet? It’s just that this one’s a bit past its sell-by-date!” He lifted his tiny instrument, which looked severely mangled.
“You’re meant to play it Perce, not eat it,” called out a bass player, hidden behind his enormous instrument.
“Fuck off Leon. At least I haven’t chosen an instrument whose size is meant to compensate for...”
“Boys! Juniors present!” scolded Gwen. The men subsided into exchanging obscene hand gestures. “Sorry Mordred,” muttered Percival to the innocent-faced teenager. The deep-voiced conductor spoke now, accent from Delhi via Bradford.
“A’ right then my loves. Please turn to number 10 in the hymn books. Pay attention to tuning, dynamics and ensemble.” And with that the rehearsal began.
After some hymn tunes and warm-ups Kahill fixed Arthur and Merlin with his alarming dark eyes and said “Well, let’s see how our new boys gel together shall we. Merlin, love, let’s hear you play Gabriel’s Oboe. Arthur, love, you play the intro and all the non-flugel solos. From the top.”
Merlin breathed in ready for his flugel solo entry. He enjoyed playing this piece - it was not technically difficult, but required a delicacy of tone that really showcased the mellow tones of a flugelhorn. He lingered on the trills and flourishes, felt the background music swell and die away around him. As he reached the end of the solo he saw Kahill’s nod of approval.
Arthur missed his cue. Kahill stopped the band with a tap of his conductors baton; Merlin tutted.
“Obviously they don’t teach them how to count at the RCM” he whispered, loudly enough for Arthur to hear. Arthur flushed and looked away. Lance tried and failed not to chuckle, earning himself a frown from Gwen and he subsided, mortified.
They played the whole piece through once.
“Aye, good, lyrical playing Merlin,” said Kahill, “but you got a bit carried away - elbows were out a bit,” he gesticulated with his elbows to illustrate his point. “Great tone, but out of time with the rest of the band. Concentrate, love.”
He turned to Arthur.
“Arthur, please count,” said Kahill, not unkindly, “Also, it’s too aggressive and too precise. Too trumpety. You’re not playing a trumpet here, love. Playing a cornet is making love, playing a trumpet is just fucking. I’m sure you understand the difference?”
“Juniors present, juniors present!” protested Gwen, furiously. Merlin choked; Lance thumped his back; the girls on trombone giggled. Arthur’s face was scarlet, a picture of mixed fury and humiliation as he put Gwaine’s instrument back to his lips.
The next run-through was flawless. Merlin and Arthur exchanged smiles of grudging respect afterwards as the rest of the band clapped and said “well done”.
Kahill gestured to the band to quieten down.
“Well done lads, nicely played,” he said. “Arthur, you tend to play with your head, sticking a little bit too rigidly to the score. Let the music out. Merlin, you play from the heart and take terrible liberties with the score. You need to maintain an accurate tempo. I think it’ll do you good working together and learning from each other. You need both head and heart to be a great player.” Both Merlin and Arthur rolled their eyes.
“Ok, time to get serious. Let’s get the contest piece out and have a run through. 'Harmony Music' please.” And the band got down to work.