East Coast Band Championships

Retrospective

East Coast of Australia Band Championships and "Festival of the Bands"
10 June 2007 Newcastle City Hall will be remembered as the year this competition was held under some of the most trying circumstances ever for banding in this region.

Having sustained cyclonic weather over 2 preceding days this was probably an event that in many ways needed to go ahead just to show that the collective strength of the brass band, those involved, and the immense time put into both rehearsal and the organisation can shine through despite what had been occurring to make this almost a complete disaster....
 
The Morning consists of the Formal adjudicated sacred item and Own Choice Test Piece and a huge mention needs to go to Waratah Brass  both Number one and Number 2 bands.  After basically finding that they were in near devastation due to floods destroying their Band Hall, music library,  and some percussion equipment they made a decision to continue on and  compete.  The Number 1 band has experienced an up and down time of late especially since the departure of previous Conductor Ron Prussing and it was wondered how they could emulate playing such as that in 2006 with The Light of the World (Goffin) at a near perfect performance coupled with St Magnus (Downie) and its brilliance in composition and wonderful execution of the band.
 
With guest Conductor Andrew Snell at the helm they were a band to be listened to in ore and wonder as they played In Perfect Peace (Downie) and the taxing Trittico for Brass Band (Curnow) as it was felt that some of the players may have actually been performing for the sheer survival of the Band to show that they can and will rise above diversity. It was fitting that this was Waratahs Day..
The No 1 band taking out the East Coast Section 1 and Division 1 Festival of the Bands with the No 2 band (Conrad Curry) winning Division 2 of the Festival.
 

Andy Snell leads Waratah Brass

Taking nothing away from the Section 2 Bands that competed Toronto Brass (Tim O'Hearn) had a good day as well winning the East Coast and coming 2nd in the afternoon Festival Entertainment Competition.

Blues Brother Ron Boaden conducts CNL Brass in the Festival of the Bands

CNL[Cardiff] Brass (Ron Boaden) came a credible 2nd in the East Coast despite playing  with several members simply unable to get there as they were flooded in. This also thru their entire afternoon Entertainment performance into disarray due to the same reason but in all soldiered on.
 
Two bands simply failed to be able to make the event but great credit goes to the Narrabri Shire Band (Sarah Smith) who had been travelling the many miles by coach prior to the bad weather and made the National Media  having met up with storms along the way.  Made up of a greater percentage of junior players the band having not competed at this event for 5 years but did a credible job especially with its sacred item of St Catherine by New Zealand composer Ray Creswell. Full credit also to Newcastle PCYC Brass (Teena Wallace) and Brisbane Water Brass (Jonathan Gatt) for an obvious improvement in playing ability from 2006 to 2007.

A very colourful Brisbane Water Brass
 
Held in the superb Newcastle City Hall this environment did little to display that just outside the door the area resembled nothing short of a War Zone with many areas of the city simply inhabitable.  Congratulations to all the bands that put the extra effort in to participating  and the fine organisation of The Hunter Regional Band Association. This event no doubt will live on in the memories of many as the year bands played on in circumstances that were the worst in 33 years the Newcastle region had experienced, but also for a day of music making that despite this was still of a very high standard and well worth attending. We look forward to next years East Coast hopefully with more bands competing  and of course minus one Cyclonic weather pattern
 
Geoffrey McGregor