Australian Concert Bands

So....

how did everybody go?

We (PMHMB) got 3 out of 4 in open c grade

Heya ben,

Very successful championships for south australia. In B grade concert band Unley placed 2nd and Tea Tree Gully placed 3rd in the competition. The quartet I played in (The clarimanets) came placed third out of 9 and was the only concert band quartet beating some good brass band quartets!.

Here are the results of the B grade competition.

(Hymn, Test, Own Choice, March) = (Total)

Sutherland PCYC - 45+190+192+45= 472 (1)
Unley Concert Band - 42+187+189+43 = 461 (2)
Tea Tree Gully Concert Band - 43+185+188+41= 451 (3)
Lane Cove Concert Band - 40+172+177+37=428 (4)
Gold Goast Wind Orchestra Inc - 38+171+177+ (missed this score )= 424 (5)
Hill Music Academy - 39+170+177+36 = 422 (6)

Great to see a big number of B grade concert bands and well done to all played. Hope to see you all in Hobart next year!.

flutesy

Unley Band SA.

Oh and to good luck to the Unley band who are now heading to Paris for the Anzac Day service. Grrrr if only I could afford that trip! oh well next time then.

Wow, only just found this forum! Lots of stuff for brass bands out there, but sooo little for concert bands atm?

Anywho, just wondering if anyone had any opinions on the Junior Band results???

Congrats to the winners and all performers in each section!

Hi Petrie

Welcome to the forum!

What band are you from? Feel free to 'spread the word' of the forum! The more the merrier!

Sorry, but I didnt get a chance to see the junior grades.

Anyone get to them?

I saw Jur C grade. The Section had 7 bands in it. It was good to see some bands with much younger players!

Mountains Youth Band won the Jur C by winning the Hymn, Test, Own Choice and Stage March. This was MYB's first time in a national contest.

St Patricks Collage Strathfield 472
The University of Newcastle Crotchets and Quavers 455
Narara Vallry High School 461
HSPA Jur Concert band 465
Mountians Youth Band 485
Knox Grammer 463
Pine Rivers Combined Band 375

I did lots of work with upper brass of MYB in the weeks leading up to the contest and it was just a delight to work with such a young talented bunch of young musicians.

Might i say that some of the Students from HSPA band(s) where very nice in their comments to me and other members of the band, this is a credit to what looks to be a very big band program they have within their school. It was a wonderful morning of music with some wonderful sounds from each band.
Well done all !

For the rest of the weekend i played with Hills Music Academy and Parramatta City Band.

Both bands played well but i must say i had a blast with Parramatta City Band. 4th place in open B grade after getting 14th out of 15 last year. We have come a long way!

Loved every second of the weekend...besides being there 4 days in a row! Hahahha!

Hey Guys,

I'm the conductor of the Pine Rivers Combined Bands Concert Band and will be spreading the word about the forums!

Was just wanting some feedback on the scores, and whether PRCB really did that badly? I know the bands that took out the top spots were deserving and played excellently, but I'm really not sure that we did THAT poorly? *shrugs* I'm probably just biased though.

On the adjudication CD I was extremely surprised by how negative James Curnow was. And he talked over some of our best sections. My other half thinks there needs to be a panel of adjudicators, not just one...though that'd take FOREVER for a result to be known. Ours seems to have been the only band to have fared so poorly across the weekend as far as bands go. Maybe I'm just after some scrap of hope that I shouldn't just save my band the embarassment of playing under my baton again??

Good to see so many bands compared with 2008 though! Concert Banding definitely has a much higher profile and more support in NSW than QLD though...wish we could fix that.

Hi Petrie

I know the following comments may be misconstrued as 'sour grapes', but i also had similar thoughts.

Our adjudicator was David King. In our section of 4, we placed third. I didnt hear any of the other bands, so i only know how we played, which i thought was quite good.

I havent heard the CD yet, but some of the comments made before the results were announced were a bit strange. I wont repeat them as i dont want to be interpreted as slandering Prof King or his judgements!!!

We console ourselves by the simple thought - the results are the opinion of one person. Each adjudicator looks for different things, and if you can work out how to please them all, please share the info lol lol!!!

Do you go to state contests? If so, how do you normally fare there? Our band pulled off a first in 2007 and that particular adjudicator said that our band was knocking on the door of B grade (thanks!!).

Its a funny game isnt it?! Still, as the old saying goes, its not the destination thats important, its the journey!!

G’day Petrie,

James Curnow did say lots of negative things about our band too!

One thing I have noticed over my Shortish time in banding is that each Adjudicator looks for different things. This year Mr Curnow was very fussy on fine tuning, tempos and expression as he said before the marks where called out. I would think that the results are biased around that and what he liked on the day.
One Theory I have about events like the National Championships is for each band to go in there and do their best and then with the feedback from the adjudicator to get back to the band room and improve from his comments. The more the band contests the more the musical director and band will grow. The only problem with that having a band in the Jur C Section there is an under 19 age rule, bands will always be up and down musically with players moving on due to age.

Don’t feel bad about your mark. The fact your band was there at the Australian National Championships is an massive achievement. Hope to see you in Hobart next year!

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the feedback.

Bensimon: Alas, there are no state competitions for concert bands in QLD, and the few that there are are ONLY for school bands. We competed at a contest at the Ekka (our version of the Royal Easter Show) and got some positive feedback from their two adjudicators. But, this contest, like so many in our area are becoming, are all about giving a 'mark' (A/B/C) or a 'medal' (gold/silver/bronze) rather than first, second, third, etc.

DanJ: Thanks so much, it is definitely the nature of the beast that different adjudicators are after different things. I should've done my homework on what Mr. Curnow would be after *slaps wrist* lol. I've been banding since 2000 with various brass bands, and have had this sort of thing happen to an Open D grade band, but I never thought I'd see it happen to a Junior band. Oh well, this'll harden them up for Hobart. Must make sure I go research Mr. de Meij!!

BTW, I only got to see the first three bands in Junior C Grade (St Patricks, Crotchets and Quavers and the one before HSPA) and thought it was great to see these smaller, young bands out there as well. I heard that HSPA, MYB and Knox are all pretty massive in comparison and am sooo jealous of your band programs right now. hehe. PRCB comes in at a nice 42 atm, but has grown over the last 4 or so years from 15. So, yes, being at 2 nationals in a row is definitely a great achievement. See you guys at Hobart! Will endeavour to keep in touch on here though.

Hey guys


FYI: the reason why my band didn't go to the nats last year was because concert bands were due to perform on Good Friday: pretty hard to have a rehearsal if you're from out of town! I suspect that would be similar for a lot of groups



Knox won Jnr B grade - clarinet solo in Blue Shades was fantastic

Castle Hill RSL Youth Band won A Grade by 24 points to ... UNewc (I think)
A more epic performance of Year of the Dragon I don't think I've seen (perhaps been a part of )

well since this forum has been quite for a while thought i mite let of some steam about nationals!. Even though im pretty happy our band came 2nd and the quartet i played in came third, some things just boiled my blood a bit, so here I go.

The lovely door people in the B grade concert band section decided to let people in and out in between our pieces AND inbetween our test peice movements! argh! so we had to sit and wait while lazy people took their time getting out of their seats. If your late seeing the band and they are onstage, well tough tinsel! Oh and people talking while we were on stage so one of our players had to tell the people in the front row to shutup!. common sense people!

I am dissapointed that james curnow had very brief comments of the section. I think he talked for about a minute (I think less than that!) and I was looking forward to what he had to say and what he like and didnt like about the bands and what you can do to improve.

Anyways, anyone else to discuss?.

Flutesy.

Unley band SA

Yeah the ushers were pretty terrible. Though apparently the MDs were supposed to tell the association that their pieces had multiple movements and the assoc was to tell the ushers? I don't know and can't explain this madness


Feedback from many places suggests Curnow either ignored or talked OVER stuff he didn't know -- which was most of it!
He was overheard declaring he didn't like "new music" and before one junior band played a note said "Blue Shades... I'm skeptical" (or words to that effect).


bah. Anyway. De meij next year. Should rock.

I agree about the ushers! It was extremely distracting to have people walking around the auditorium during our test performance - the ushers knew there was more than one movement in the test - there was no excuse. Its really not hard to wait until applause before opening the door. At least they should have known the deal by the fifth band but there were still people being let in during the last bands in our section. As for the people talking, I was one of the people close to the edge of the stage in the front row and one of the girls next to me had to turn around and tell off the rude audience member in the front row who talked all the way through the slow movements of our test. Whatever happened to discipline of audiences in competition venues? Its getting worse year by year.

On a positive note, may I extend congratulations to all the winners of the concert band divisions and to Melissa Coleman (Sydney Wind Symphony) for her victory in the Concert champion of champions event - I heard her performance in the open division and it was top notch. I have heard there were some very fine performances all round in the band divisions and it was pleasing to see so many entries - hopefully the C grade competition can have more entries to really heat up the concert bands' contest in Hobart 2010.

Nicole - Unley Concert Band

steamroller60 wrote:He was overheard declaring he didn't like "new music"

He's got to be kidding. Has he heard his own compositions??

MattL wrote:

steamroller60 wrote:He was overheard declaring he didn't like "new music"

He's got to be kidding. Has he heard his own compositions??

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