James Blades
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James Blades OBE (9 September 190119 May 1999) was an English
percussionist A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...
. He was one of the most distinguished percussionists in Western music, with a long and varied career. His book ''Percussion Instruments and their History'' (1971) is a standard reference work on the subject.Michael Skinner, ''In Memoriam: James Blades OBE'', Percussive Arts Society, 1999
Retrieved August 8, 2007. Blades was born in
Peterborough Peterborough () is a cathedral city in Cambridgeshire, east of England. It is the largest part of the City of Peterborough unitary authority district (which covers a larger area than Peterborough itself). It was part of Northamptonshire until ...
in 1901.Nick Ravo, "James Blades Is Dead at 97; a Percussionist for Victory"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' (May 25, 1999). Retrieved August 8, 2007. He was a long-time associate of
Benjamin Britten Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...
, with whom he conceived many of the composer's unusual percussion effects. In 1954, Blades was appointed Professor of Percussion at the
Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is the oldest conservatoire in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the first Duke of ...
. As a chamber musician he played with the
Melos Ensemble The Melos Ensemble is a group of musicians who started in 1950 in London to play chamber music in mixed instrumentation of string instruments, wind instruments and others. Benjamin Britten composed the chamber music for his ''War Requiem'' for the ...
and the
English Chamber Orchestra The English Chamber Orchestra (ECO) is a British chamber orchestra based in London. The full orchestra regularly plays concerts at Cadogan Hall, and their ensemble performs at Wigmore Hall. The orchestra regularly tours in the UK and internationall ...
. Blades' pupils included the rock
drummer A drummer is a percussionist who creates music using drum The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one mem ...
s
Max Sedgley Max Sedgley is a British producer, drummer and disc jockey, currently signed to the independent record label, Sunday Best (founded by Rob da Bank), and Jalapeno Records. In 2004, Sedgley released his first single, "Happy", a remix of which was ...
,
Carl Palmer Carl Frederick Kendall Palmer (born 20 March 1950) is an English drummer best known as founding member and the last surviving member of the progressive rock supergroup Emerson, Lake & Palmer. He was also a founding member of progressive rock s ...
, and
Richard James Burgess Richard James Burgess (born 29 June 1949) is an English musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, composer, author, manager, marketer and inventor. Burgess's music career spans more than 50 years. He came to prominence in the early 1980s a ...
as well as percussionist
Evelyn Glennie Dame Evelyn Elizabeth Ann Glennie, (born 19 July 1965) is a Scottish people, Scottish percussionist. She was selected as one of the two laureates for the Polar Music Prize of 2015. Early life Glennie was born in Methlick, Aberdeenshire in Sco ...
. His most famous and widely heard performances were the sound of the drum playing "V-for-Victory" in
Morse code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of ...
, the introduction to the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
broadcasts made to the European Resistance during
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, and providing the sound of the gong seen at the start of films produced by the
Rank Organisation The Rank Organisation was a British entertainment conglomerate founded by industrialist J. Arthur Rank in April 1937. It quickly became the largest and most vertically integrated film company in the United Kingdom, owning production, distribu ...
. Blades played this sound on a
tam-tam A gongFrom Indonesian and ms, gong; jv, ꦒꦺꦴꦁ ; zh, c=鑼, p=luó; ja, , dora; km, គង ; th, ฆ้อง ; vi, cồng chiêng; as, কাঁহ is a percussion instrument originating in East Asia and Southeast Asia. Gongs ...
. On screen Blades's sound was mimed to by the "
Gongman The Gongman (also known as the "man-with-the-gong") is a company trademark for the J. Arthur Rank Organisation. It was used as the introduction to all Rank films, many of which were shot at their Pinewood Studios, and included those Rank distri ...
". His autobiography ''Drum Roll: A Professional Adventure from the Circus to the Concert Hall'' was published by
Faber & Faber Faber and Faber Limited, usually abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in London. Published authors and poets include T. S. Eliot (an early Faber editor and director), W. H. Auden, Margaret Storey, William Golding, Samuel B ...
in 1977.


Bibliography

*''Orchestral Percussion Techniques'' (Oxford: University, 1961) *''Percussion Instruments and their History'' (London: Faber & Faber, 1971) *''Early Percussion Instruments from the Middle Ages to the Baroque'' (Oxford: University, 1976) (with Jeremy Montagu) *''Drum Roll: A Professional Adventure from the Circus to the Concert Hall'' (London: Faber & Faber, 1977) *''Ready to Play'' (London: BBC, 1978) (with Carole Ward) *''From Cave to Cavern'' (London: Sussex, 1982) *''A Check-List of the Percussion Instruments in the Edinburgh University Collection of Historic Musical Instruments'' (Edinburgh: Reid School of Music, 1982) *''How to Play Drums'' (London: Penguin, 1985) (with Johnny Dean) *''These I Have Met...'' (London: Music Sales, 1998)


References


External links


Obituary
from ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Blades, James 1901 births 1999 deaths Academics of the Royal Academy of Music Bass drum players British classical percussionists Classical percussionists English classical musicians Officers of the Order of the British Empire 20th-century classical musicians 20th-century English musicians 20th-century drummers