Hannaford Street Silver Band - Heavy Metal

2007 Hannaford Festival of Brass
Artistic Director: Curtis Metcalf
Jane Mallett Theatre, St. Lawrence Centre
Toronto, Ontario
Sunday, 4th March

Heavy Metal indeed. This concert, the finale of the Hannaford Street Silver Band festival weekend, was originally intended to feature the tuba virtuoso John Griffiths. However he suffered a serious illness not too long before the event and so the Hannaford team, with the assistance of soloists from the Salvation Army's New York Staff Band, made a few changes to the line-up while maintaining the overall focus on Heavy Metal.

After the traditional pre-concert chat featuring executive director Ray Tizzard and soloists Michael Baker (cornet) and Aaron VanderWeele, euphonium, the Hannaford Youth band tuba-euphonium quartet presented a brief prelude in the lobby of the Jane Mallet Theatre. All present then decanted to the theatre proper.

The Hannaford Street Silver Band opened the concert with the Concorde March by the late Robert Farnon, Toronto born trumpet player, composer and former leader of the Canadian Band of the Allied Expeditionary forces in Europe during the Second World War. Music Director Curtis Metcalf managed the Master of Ceremonies role, and introduced the first heavy metal soloist- E flat tuba Rob Brown with the Arban arrangement of the classic variation solo Carnival of Venice. Very stylishly played, with all the technical flourish expected.

This was followed by a surprise addition to the program- an original work for brass band by Marcus Venables, son of HSSB solo cornet player Robert Venables. Entitled Motondo, this work displayed the energetic style that might be expected of a just-turned-16 year old composer: a very rhythmic opening, technically demanding for all sections in the band, a brief chorale-like interlude with echoes of ‘Rule Britannia', followed by a return to the rhythmic style and finishing with a resounding fanfare. The HSSB, while at 26 members not the powerhouse that is the larger New York Staff Band, displayed itself extremely well in this premiere presentation. The ovation for the composer was well deserved.

Then Metcalf called upon tuba player Nick Atkinson to introduce the Dean Goffin work Rhapsody in Brass. He related his long-standing desire to play this work, dating from having heard it on the radio as a young musician. The three-part work, which includes a beautiful horn solo (Linda Bronicheski) in the second ‘Andante' movement, was an excellent addition to the program.

Once again delegating a portion of the MC chore, Metcalf drew Youth Program co-leader Anita McAlister off the front cornet bench to introduce the winner of the Hannaford Street Youth Program soloist contest. From an initial group of about 15 contestants over several months and through a combination of adjudicated and ‘Idol' type audience polling, the final winner from Saturday morning's competition was cornet soloist Rob Weymouth. With accompaniment of the HSSB, he presented our second Carnival of Venice for the day- the Herbert L. Clarke version.

The HSSB then closed the first half of the concert with Flourish and Dances. This work by Canadian composer Kevin Norbury (who also plays horn in the Intrada Brass, one of the Community Festival participants from the Saturday event) is an intricate and technically demanding arrangement of themes from Renaissance dances. The 4 movements- Flourish, Pavane, Basse Dance and Hornpipe, give the band an excellent workout. In particular the final two movements require that the middle portions of the band manage the handling of melodic fragments tossed back and forth with the cornet section. This was a stirring conclusion to the first half of the concert.

The second half of the concert opened with a very stately presentation by Metcalf and the HSSB of the Rimmer march Slaidburn. This classic work, written for the band and town of the same name near Oxford in England, was the contest piece for the first ever Hannaford Cup competition. Presented to the winning community band- the Maple Leaf Brass Band by HSSB Executive director Ray Tizzard, this silver cup begins what hopefully will become a tradition of good-natured competition amongst the community band invitees to the festival.

Those who have attended the first two festivals as either participants or performers can already attest to the technical and stylistic improvements that have taken place in the performances of the various bands.

The first visiting soloist of the afternoon was a bit lighter metal Michael Baker, a student of Phil Smith and member of the Salvation Army's New York Staff Band, offered the Stanley Boddington cornet solo Silver Threads Among the Gold. Baker beautifully presented this very pleasant solo with a sensitive accompaniment by the HSSB.

It was followed by a slightly heavier metal work. In 2003, Stephen Bulla wrote a solo for Aaron VanderWeele to play when the New York Staff Band went to Albert Hall. The play on words Air'n Variations makes use of VanDerWeele's Salvation Army heritage with the tune ‘twas a very happy day' and his interest in the tone poems of Hindemith to create a showpiece for the euphonium. It includes a fairly ponderous sounding waltz interlude, and concludes with a spectacular race to the final sustained high F finale.

Both soloists then returned to offer another Herbert L. Clarke work, this one the duet Cousins. Usually featuring trombone and cornet, the two NYSB soloists and the HSSB impressed us once again.

The day and the weekend finished with a Peter Graham work. Once a member of the New York Staff Band, the composer wrote Shine As the Light in dedication to a late tuba playing colleague in the NYSB. And so the focus on Heavy Metal was complete. An excellent conclusion to an excellent weekend, which has become a local tradition, the Hannaford Street Silver band Community festival.

Norm Buckley

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