Australian Concert Bands

Greetings!

Thanks for dropping by!

I decided to create this forum as I could never find a forum for Concert Band musos (or squeaky bands as the Brass Band players call us!! )

The Brass players have the highly successful SpitValve http://spitvalve.com.au, but I couldn't find any thing for the concert bandies!

So, make yourself at home, post plenty of messages, and let all the other concert band players around know about the forum!!!

I was thinking along the same lines, but you beat me to it!

Hope this forums take off and we can get some real discussion on Aussie Concert Bands - and put the word out that there is more to banding than just brass!

Cheers!

i certainly hope this site is sucessful as a forum for squeakies to keep in contact with each other and to promote your bands,and ideas

best of luck

Congratulations Ben for starting this forum.

Well done Ben this is a great forum site. Very Interesting

Well, there are two sides to this story:

1. It's good to see that there is now a forum that will reflect the specialist interests of concert bands - hopefully nationally. Well done to those that have kicked things off! Let's hope we can be positive and constructive.

2. When will the majority of people in our bands realise that we are all in the same boat together - for audiences, resources, funding, sponsorship, and profile? Everybody out there in the general public recognises that if a band looks like a band, sounds like a band, drinks like a band...well, it probably IS a band. Everybody - except our own people.

So we'll see how things go...

Jubey

Hi Jubey

Welcome to the forum!

Not too sure if i understand your second point

If you are referring to the rivalry between bands, i think that there will always be a bit of friendly competition and stirring between bandsmembers - but there are always people who take it way to far.

Community bands (concert and brass) are meant to be fun for all involved! I know that some of our bands biggest supporters aren't actual players but are there for the love of music! But it is always dissapointing to see bands get too competitive, and see things happen such as what happened in the recent NSW State Champs

bensimon wrote:But it is always dissapointing to see bands get too competitive, and see things happen such as what happened in the recent NSW State Champs

What happened?

An A grade brass band was fined $3000.00 for breaching rules around emergency permits

Go to http://www.4barsrest.com/news/du_detail.asp?id=6313

This topic has had quite a lengthy discussion on spitvalve (topic now locked)

I think it is disappointing to see some individuals within band managment structures displaying dishonestly, poor judgement, and questionable ethics. Such things have been going on for years, so it's good to see some action being taken.

Isn't competion a good thing? Some bands thrive on the challenge!

Jubey

Totally agree. I know our band really knuckles down and focuses and works really hard for contests! It was by doing this that we managed to win C Grade State.

But the bottom line is we go in, do our best, and HAVE FUN!

I am on our band's committee, and one thing that is always in our minds is that whatever decisions we make, we are accountable to the rest of the organisation that has elected us to those positions.

Its good to see the BA of NSW enforcing the rules. If something happened and they let it go, the whole competition has lost its integrity.