Chalford Band

Conductor: Steve Tubb
Cirencester Parish Church
Saturday November 18th

As the strategically important Roman town of Corinium and then as the centre of the local woollen trade in the 17th and 18 centuries Cirencester is steeped in history.

This history was added to on Saturday night when Chalford Band (the new Pontin's First Section champions) played in Cirencester Parish Church for the first time.
St John the Baptist church is one of the largest parish churches in the country and is known locally as the 'Cathedral of the Cotswolds. This magnificent lofted building really suited the rounded musical sounds from the band.

The programme chosen by the band's conductor Steve Tubb was entertaining and full of musical variety. 'Fanfare and Flourishes' by James Curnow opened the concert and the finale was the exciting Adventures in Brass' by Ray Farr.

In between, the audience were treated to the movie dance classic Singing in the Rain, the big band standard ‘Mack The Knife', ‘In Perfect Peace' by Kenneth Downie, ‘Somewhere Out There' from the film ‘An American Tail', ‘Say A Little Prayer' by Burt Bacharrach, the wonderfully crafted tribute to "Old Blue Eyes" - Salute to Sinatra by Philip Harper, Bruce Broughton's ‘Deep River' in the style of Count Bassie, 'With One Look' from the Andrew Lloyd-Webber show ‘Sunset Boulevard', which featured Josie Smith on the solo cornet melody, ‘Fanfare and Flying Theme' from ET by John Williams and the plaintiff ‘Lament' from ‘Cry Of The Celts' by Peter Graham, which featured just the lower band.

There were four solos and a trombone trio. Euphonium player Martin Clissold treated the audience to his warm melifluous playing in Kenneth Downie's beautiful arrangement of the Scottish traditional melody 'My Love Is Liked A Red, Red Rose'. Billy Joel's classic love song ‘Just the Way You Are' was stylishly performed by flugel player Katie Godwin. Dave Nairn (trombone) captured the mood perfectly in his rendition of Disney's crowd-pleasing ‘I Wanna Be Like You' (from ‘The Jungle Book').

Bev Godwin displayed the full rich sound of the tenor horn in her performance of Darrol Barry's fine arrangement of The Carpenters' version of Lennon and McCartney's ‘Ticket To Ride'.

The three trombone players Dave Young, Dave Nairn and Andy Smith featured as a strong section in Goff Richard's lively arrangement of ‘ I Will Follow Him'(the main theme from the Whoopi Goldberg film Sister Act).

The concert was part of the Cirencester's Advent Festival 2006 and was sponsored by Le Spa. Hopefully, it will not be too long before the band are asked back to play again!

Andrew Godwin

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