East Anglian Brass band contest

Ipswich trom

Ipswich trom

Member
Results from the contest in Norwich.

Championship.

1st - Ipswich and Norwich Co op (1st in Hymn tune, 1st in Entertainment)
2nd - Matthews Norfolk Brass (2nd in Hymn tune, 2nd in Entertainment)
3rd - Cawston (3rd in Hymn tune, 3rd in Entertainment)

A Section.

1st - Colchester (3rd in Hymn tune, 1st in Entertainment)
2nd - Newmarket ( 2nd in Hymn tune, 2nd in Entertainmet)
3rd - Fulbourn & Teversham (1st in Hymn tune, 3rd in Entertainment)

B Section.

Clean sweep for Dereham band.

It was a great day (certainly for us :D ), and the evening concert by Grimethorpe was excellent.
 
Leyfy

Leyfy

Active Member
Many congratulations to Cawston too, who certainly held their own in the championship section. Great day - *almost* worth the 6am start!!!

Heard about half the bands, and it was a close run thing in the championship section as some great playing (Cornet solo from Cawston very impressive, in my opionion) - but think the right result at the top, of course!!!! ;)

Best solo horn for Ruth too - just confirming what we all knew in the horn section!! :)
 
C

Chunky

Active Member
Thanks for the kind words Kimmi, and congratulations to all at Ipswich (only in a brass banding sense ;-)
 
C

Chunky

Active Member
Also congratulations to Steve 'Ting-tang-macca-ding-dang' Clarke on his award as best Euphonium.

Steve was interviewed afterwards by the Cawston Chronicle and he said:

'This award fills me with so much pride I could blah. It gives me a year to tell the whole of Cawston Band that I am always right and I am near on perfect. Its a right laugh.

I must just thank the band for supporting me so much during my severe medical problems over the last year, they are a constant source of humour and understanding to my afflictions.

Finally I must just thank Mark, Pav, Chunky & Big John who between them play most of my more difficult passages'

Steve went on about this for several hours afterwards but the reporter had to leave as a ferret had staged an armed robbery at Cawston Post Office
 
Robin Norman

Robin Norman

Member
What a day, crowned Champion Band of East Anglia - a deserved result.

Well done to all at Ipswich, you worked really hard (including two extra rehearsals over the BH weekend) and you can be justifiably proud of the result and the trophy hawl. No split decision this year we won both hymn tune and entertainment program, making us the Champion Band by three clear points. My day was made even better with the fact that I got to perform as a dep with Grimethorpe in the evening as well, a fantastic band and a great bunch of people (I've never played Festive Overture so fast !!!)

Well done to my old playing band Matthews as well on your second place (it's your fault I ever got into this Brass Band scene) and especially to Chunky and all at Cawston; I have to admit I didn't hear you as I had to find some time somewhere to get something to east before the Grimey rehearsal but everyone I spoke to who did said that you pushed us and MNB all the way, it is great to see another East Anglian Band on a great upward trend.

I listened to 5 bands including those at the 'lower end' and I was actually really impressed with the way these bands are improving as well, keep up the good work all; East Anglia has some bands of which we can be justifiably proud.

I'm proud of my association to Ipswich, a great bunch of hard-working people with a great team spirit. 2008 is already the band's most successful year ever, let's keep it up and push at Harrogate in September representing with pride East Anglia and the London & Southern Counties.
 
2nd trom virtuoso

2nd trom virtuoso

Member
It is good to see some bands striving but at the same time many bands around this area - especially Cambridgeshire, are struggling to carry on in existance.

This shows in the number of participating bands steeply declining at this contest, its no longer a strong area its just 2 or 3 strong bands doing well - which is brilliant to see but it paints a faulse picture on the state of banding around parts of East Anglia. There are diminishing numbers of new young players - of my generation there really is only a few.

This contest and its local bands have every reason to be worried if we don't start encouraging kids to play brass instruments in this area

Congratulations to the winners, I & N co-op.
 
C

Chunky

Active Member
2nd trom virtuoso said:
It is good to see some bands striving but at the same time many bands around this area - especially Cambridgeshire, are struggling to carry on in existance.

This shows in the number of participating bands steeply declining at this contest, its no longer a strong area its just 2 or 3 strong bands doing well - which is brilliant to see but it paints a faulse picture on the state of banding around parts of East Anglia. There are diminishing numbers of new young players - of my generation there really is only a few.

This contest and its local bands have every reason to be worried if we don't start encouraging kids to play brass instruments in this area

Congratulations to the winners, I & N co-op.
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Hi Matt

I think there are concerns like this all over the country, not just East Anglia.

You cite Cambridgeshire as an area of numbers diminishing, well Chatteris, Newmarket and Fulbourn & Teversham competed this year. Waterbeach did last year but not this and of course are going strong with joint concerts with the like of Fodens (did not hear it, but understand it was a great success).

Also Littleport have qualified for the finals.

I bow to your local knowledge, but to an outsider it seems Cambridgeshire is doing well!
 
Ipswich trom

Ipswich trom

Member
I'm with Chunky on this one, certain bands in the area are doing very well. I think it comes down to the philosophy of the band and to use my band as an example; when i joined 10 years ago there were some really excellent players in the band and I felt quite in awe. I'm talking about people who now play with or have played for some of the top bands in the country yet we struggled to get any decent contest results. Why? Because we hardly ever saw some of these people as they were aither off with their Army band or doing other jobs. We regularly had empty seats at rehearsals.

Since Robin Norman came along as our MD we have moved on so much and our normal rehearsal attendance is averaging 90% +. The reason for this is that we took the decision that we would rather have a band there week in week out that only ever see a full band at a concert or contest. We may have had to bring in players that may not have been quite up to the standard we would have wished but at least they are there. This philosophy has really paid dividends.

Of course every so often we need to bring in someone (as happened at this years area) but only for an odd position.

On the issue of youngsters taking up Brass, I don't think there is necessarily a shortage but more that they are not necessarily encouraged by their schools to take part in out of school activities. I may be wrong on this but speak from experience in this aprt of East Anglia.
 
B

Bruno

New Member
2nd trom virtuoso said:
It is good to see some bands striving but at the same time many bands around this area - especially Cambridgeshire, are struggling to carry on in existance.

This shows in the number of participating bands steeply declining at this contest, its no longer a strong area its just 2 or 3 strong bands doing well - which is brilliant to see but it paints a faulse picture on the state of banding around parts of East Anglia. There are diminishing numbers of new young players - of my generation there really is only a few.

This contest and its local bands have every reason to be worried if we don't start encouraging kids to play brass instruments in this area

Congratulations to the winners, I & N co-op.
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How depressing is this post, had a bad day 2ndtrom ?

Let's look at the facts. According to the East Anglian Association website they cover bands from Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and Essex. Looking at the L&SC regional results this year that means that, from the 126 bands that took part over the weekend there were,in total, (by my dodgy Midlander calculations) 20 bands from East Anglia in the various sections breaking down to 2 in the Ch, 5 in the 1st, 3 in the 2nd, 4 in the 3rd and 6 in the 4th. Of that lot 2 qualified for their respective national finals and there were 3 others 'in the placings;. Hardly time to all give up and go home is it !!

The problems you mention are being experienced all over the country and is something all bands are having to overcome - the reality is that, in many places, orchestral instruments are preferred over brass band ones and there are not many brass bands in schools. We have to make the whole band movement more appealing to the youngsters but sitting at home moaning about how bad the education system is is not going to solve it - why not do something about it, get out there and enthuse the younger learners into joining your band.

However, it could just be that there are some sour grapes that one band is doing well and you're a little depressed as your band didn't enter the contest - I note elsewhere on the forum that you are advertising vacancies into double figures. Why not take IpswichTrom's advice and, instead of looking at was has been (quote "were very successful in the Championship Section") look forward and build a band with enthusiasm and effort, you may have to accept moving down a peg or two but it's got to be better than just moaning about how bad it is.
 
C

Chunky

Active Member
Blagger said:
How many were in the B section?

Dereham was my first band - which you nerver forget do you ;)
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Unfortunately only 1 B section band entered, Dereham. However they did play exceptionally well on the day and would have probably won if others had entered.
 
K

Keith

Member
Got another question!! :D

The Hymn tune. Does that come from the red hymn book, or a hymn tune arrangement? Something that I can provide words for? I was thinking of doing Prelude on Tallis with my lot, by Peter Graham Its based on the hymn tune in the red book, is that ok?
 
Ipswich trom

Ipswich trom

Member
Keith said:
Got another question!! :D

The Hymn tune. Does that come from the red hymn book, or a hymn tune arrangement? Something that I can provide words for? I was thinking of doing Prelude on Tallis with my lot, by Peter Graham Its based on the hymn tune in the red book, is that ok?
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Keith,
it has to be a hymn tune with words supplied but after that you can do what you like with it. The only issue now as I see it is that your selection and copies of the scores had to be in by yesterday (Friday 27th March) according to the entry rules!
 
L

Lewis Chris

Member
Ipswich and Colchester are going. I've heard that Cawston is going again too, but Chunky will know better than I do. Not sure what will happen in the B section though. As there was only one band last year, and they unsurprisingy won it (That's not a dig, they played very well) and got promoted.
 
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