City of Hull and Barton Community Band open their doors ahead of the North of England Areas
Both the City of Hull Band and Barton Community Band opened their doors to the public for a open rehearsal to showcase their test piece’s ahead of the North of England Brass Band Championships on the 22nd and 23rd of March 2025. The audience were treated to some interesting insight into preparations of the test pieces. We were also joined by Danny Brooks, musical director of the Leyland Band who was providing insight and feedback throughout the rehearsal his own judging tent.
Barton Community Band started working on their their section test piece, Arkansas by Jacob De Haan. This forms part of a set of pieces named after American states. The conductor, Garry Oglesby provided some insight into the piece and conducted several sections along with various bits of rehearsal, accumulating with a full performance. Open rehearsals such as this provide a great opportunity to see more insight into a musical director’s interpretation of the work and also how a rehearsal is conducted. Following the rehearsal I took the opportunity to catch up with Garry and hear his thoughts on the bands progress:
“Last night was a great opportunity for players from both bands performing and those listening to support the performances from Barton and Hull bands. And a good chance to put ourselves under a bit of pressure. With two weeks to go we had some great feedback from Danny Brooks our”adjudicator” for the evening which will help prepare us for the contest day. It was nice to see players mingling afterwards, supporting each other in this weird thing we do to ourselves and the general opinion was it’s most important to enjoy the challenge.” Garry Oglesby, Barton Community Band.
Following Barton Community Band, the City of Hull took to the stage to work on their Championship Section test piece, Diversions by Derek Bourgeois. This piece really provides a tough challenge for all parts; with changing time signatures and exposed parts, there really is something to test all sections of the band. This rehearsal was led by Jonathan Beatty, who also conducts Unite the Union Band. Again this was a great opportunity to hear elements of the test piece and understand more about the direction of the piece with the excellent running commentary of Jonathan Beatty. Following the rehearsal Jonathan had this to say:
“It was a wonderful and productive evening of music making at the preview event in Hull. Barton Town Band, conducted by Gary Oglesby, sounded great and as always, I loved conducting the City of Hull band. We’ve enjoyed the piece that has unique challenges and feel we have benefitted by playing it out. We know what we need to do to improve in the next two weeks. A special thanks to Danny Brookes who showed us his expertise and insights in the piece after his qualification to the “nationals” with the Leyland band.” Jonathan Beatty, City of Hull Band.
I’d like to wish the best of look to both bands at the North of England Areas!
