It has been confirmed that 37 bands and over 1,500 players will compete in the 2025 New Zealand National Championships in Christchurch between the 2nd and 6th July.

In what promises to be an exciting Antipodean battle, five bands will make the journey from Australia to compete — the highest number in 34 years.

Format

The Championships at Christchurch Town Hall will be adjudicated by Swiss conductor Frederic Theodoloz as Chief Adjudicator and Nick Johnson.

The format of the contest includes set-work, own-choice and sacred item. The defending A Grade champion is Wellington Brass who will be looking to claim a seventh consecutive win at the event and eleventh in the last twelve contesting years.

The event will be live-streamed by Tim Kelly at: www.brassbanned.com

The set works are:
A Grade: A Tale As Yet Untold (Philip Sparke)
B Grade: Sounds (John Golland)
C Grade: The Lost Village of Imber (Christopher Bond)
D Grade: Be Still (David J Evans arr. Stephen Tighe)
Youth Grade: Own choice

Encouraging news

It is the latest encouraging news for the New Zealand banding movement, with BBNZ President John Sullivan saying in his column in the on-line 'The Mouthpiece' magazine, that he felt "so much great work is happening within our organisation".

It was an opinion strengthened by the fact that there will be a record 45 entrants in the Junior Slow Melody event at the Championships and that there had been 87 applications to be part of the 2025 National Secondary Schools' Band course later in the year.

BBNZ President John Sullivan saying in his column in the on-line 'The Mouthpiece' magazine, that he felt "so much great work is happening within our organisation"4BR

Build on success

He also highlighted the importance of building on the success at the BBANZ Conference which will be held in Wellington in November, stating that it provided, "a chance to engage with a broad cross section of our members through varied training workshops."

This was vitally important he said as the organisation currently falls short of meeting funding criteria of the Arts body, Creative New Zealand at present.

Sullivan added that it therefore meant that "we look to secure our future by supporting ourselves" through the BBANZ Charitable Trust which could fund reinvestment into the BBANZ organisation.