A great day at the Wessex Winter Contest for VCB

Saturday 29th November

Verwood Concert Brass and for the first time, the Verwood Town Band, competed in the Wessex Brass Band Association 58th Annual Winter Contest at the Life Centre in Bournemouth and came away with a fantastic four pieces of silverware!

Verwood Concert Brass won a cup for the best 1st section band coming 4th in the test piece and 2nd for the March. Ian Harris won the Tom Gomersall Memorial Cup for the best Euphonium and Susan Johnson won the Maurice Woods Trophy for the best first section band cornet.

The Verwood Town Band picked up the trophy for being the 2nd placed 4th section band but impressively came 15th overall beating a number of 3rd section bands with new MD Emma Button having only been two weeks at the helm. 

Well done all and what a brilliant way to end the 2014 contesting year in our 150th Jubilee year.

All of the bands now look forward to having some festive fun in the run up to Christmas.

Armistice Parade 2014

The Band lead the march from St Michael's Church to the Memorial outside the Heritage Centre in this the 100th year since the outbreak of the first world war.
  

The Last Post was played beautifully by Sophie Howes.

The Training Band Coffee morning

Saturday 8th November

The Verwood Memorial Hall was full by 10.30 and they were not going anywhere, it was raining too hard and the music was too good.

Well done to all for a really good show and to Mike Dunnings for his great conducting.

The Acorns showed their tangible progress under the direction of Sean Moran who was standing in for Sophie Howes. 

VCB Achieve a Double Win

Saturday 1st November

VCB earned themselves a fantastic result at the 68th Annual Championships of the South West Brass Band Association held on Saturday 1st November. Not only did they win the special award for the highest placed First Section Band but also won the contest out right. Fantastic!

VCB traveled down to the Riviera Centre in Torquay to take part in the 'Open Section' of the contest which is for Championship Section and First Section Bands to compete in. It was an 'Own Choice' event meaning each band could choose a test piece to play. VCB's choice was 'Spectrum' by Gilbert Vintner.

The band had a long wait before competing, having been drawn last to play but on the upside this meant there was less time to wait for the results. But no matter how long the wait may have been they were absolutely worth waiting for. What a great result for the band.

Big congratulations to everyone in achieving this fantastic result.

100th anniversary of the start of the First World War

August 5th 2014

The 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War.

An ensemble of VCB players were very proud to play at the WW1 memorial service on Ferret Green in Verwood.

 Sophie Howes played a stunning Last Post:

Wessex Summer School

July 28th - August 2nd.

18 members of Verwood Concert Brass had a fantastic week at the Wessex Summer School over at Sturminster Newton.  The two final concerts, Training Band in the morning and Brass and Wind Bands in the afternoon were incredible.  Hopefully we can increase Green Army numbers even more next year.

 

Verwood Concert Brass Masterclass

Sunday 20th July

To round off our celebrations 50 members attended a Masterclass conducted by Mike Fowles.  This was a really great day, enjoyed by all and rounded off by a mini concert in the Hideaway to show off what we had learned.  Thanks, Mike, we all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and now have no excuse if we get out of time - subdivide, subdivide, subdivide!!
 

 

 

Our 150th Jubilee concert at the Hub in Verwood

Saturday 19th July

The audience were taken on a journey through time to celebrate the achievements of Verwood Concert Brass over the years. 

The Band was initially formed by Jessie Shearing in 1864 and known as Verwood Temperance Band.  

The concert opened with 7 players in the auditorium dressed in Victorian clothing playing two hymn tunes.

Our narrator, Paul Fensom then introduced the massed Band of Verwood Concert Brass as the curtains opened.  The audience were blown away (literally!) by the volume and sheer numbers who now make up all the Bands. 

The Acorns did themselves proud under the baton of our Principal cornet player, Sophie Howes and were an instant hit with the crowd. 

Verwood Town Band played music from the war years including Glenn Miller's Moonlight Serenade and the Magnificent Seven. 

 
Verwood Training Band took their music from the 60s and 70s giving a fabulous rendition of Ruby Tuesday by the Rolling Stones to name but one number. 
 

Verwood Concert Brass played some mesmerising pieces and Cry me a River had the audience spellbound.  A standing ovation was given and an encore of 'Caravan' was the icing on the cake.  What a fabulous concert which was shared with hundreds of Hub neighbours as a temperature on stage of nearly 30 degrees meant all the doors were wide open.

Well done to all our soloist and duettists...

The Souvenir Programme which was 16 pages long! was expertly produced by Sally Mullins who is not even a Band member - great job, Sally and thanks from us all.

The Town Band playing at Pilford Steam Festival

Sunday 13th July

150th Jubilee of Verwood Concert Brass

Saturday 12th July

A celebration of the 150th year of Verwood Concert Brass.  What a fantastic jubilee fete which is now the talk of the town.  A hugely successful event which has produced many comments from local people saying they want more of this in Verwood.  

Well done to Sophie Howes:

 and the organising committee who spent this past year putting it together. 

 

 The amazingggg cup cake stall

 

An ever changing audience throughout the day were entertained by all three Bands

 

 Simon and Rhys waiting for the rush & a race to catch the ducks

Verwood Carnival 2014

Saturday 28th June

Once again Verwood Concert Brass lead the Verwood Carnival Procession. This time all three bands took part and despite weather warnings the Sun stayed out.

Training Band's Busiest Day

Saturday 21th June

Another fantastic Coffee Morning Concert by the Training Band under the baton of Mike Dunnings.

 

It was also an opportunity for the first public performance of The Acorns, for brand new starters, lead by Sophie Howes. They played 'When the saints' and 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star' brilliantly followed by Rowan playing a solo - two encores too!

Not to be out done by the youngsters some more mature members of the Training Band, Geoff, Jan and Sue also played their individual pieces brilliantly and ably demonstrated why VCB likes to encourage anyone and everyone to join us and have fun making music.

  
Cranborne Church Fete at Cranborne Manor.

Following on from the Coffee Morning Concert the Training Band had another gig that very afternoon at the Cranborne Church fete.

Doing two gigs in one day (due to a late change of the date of the fete) made it difficult to get a full Training Band out but that's the great thing about VCB as players from the principal band and the Town Band filled in the gaps to form a great combined band.

As can be seen from the photo's the sun was shining, there were loads of people, a wonderful setting and we had a lot of fun making music. A marvelous way to spend an afternoon.