All is in readiness for the 140th anniversary show of the Ballina Shire Concert Band at Lennox Head Cultural Centre on Saturday, with a few tickets remaining for anyone who wants to join in celebrating the band’s musical passion.
The Echo caught up with bandleader Laurie Green at the band’s final rehearsal before the big concert.
Any last words? ‘I don’t have any last words, but we are running a last rehearsal. My expectation is that the gig on Saturday will be an absolute blinder!’
Mr Green says the band is responding very well to the pressure, with no sign of jitters among his players. The programs have been printed and the special guests are rehearsing with the regular players.
So what would you say to people who are tossing up coming to listen to the band on Saturday night or watching the new king being crowned?
‘I would say watching TV is a bad choice, and they should come along to the concert. We’re deliberately playing some British patriotic tunes for the occasion so they won’t miss out entirely.’
Laurie Green said the band is going to be musically time travelling through all its different incarnations and styles at the Lennox concert.
‘Yes, we’re starting with a 10 piece brass band that’s representative of the original 1883 band. Then we’ll bring the entire band on stage, and do four pieces that have been popular with concert bands and brass bands over the years.
‘From that we move into a short program of German oompah beerfest music, because the band did quite a bit of that work in the late ’80s.’
Any special costumes happening? ‘I suspect the players are cooking something up. No lederhosen though!’
Past to present
Mr Green said the band will be moving into current repertoire after the interval.
‘We start with a piece called “You Can’t Stop The Beat”, which I thought was appropriate, given that we’ve been going for so long.
‘We’ve got a beautiful Duke Ellington sax solo, a really interesting tuba solo. Some Hans Zimmer music from the movie Gladiator…’
Saturday’s concert at Lennox Head Community Centre will also feature about a dozen guest players from near and far, with ‘close to 50 musicians’ taking to the stage. It’s going to be a big sound, for a big space. Mr Green has played there before with the Lismore Symphony Orchestra, but said it’s a first for Ballina Concert Band.
Sounds like you’ve got enough players to pump out some serious sound. ‘Yes, I don’t think we’ll have any trouble being heard!’
Band in the blood
Leanne Fuller is one of the special guests, travelling down from Toowoomba. Her father and grandfather both played in earlier incarnations of the Ballina Band, through good times and bad. Growing up, she remembers, ‘it wasn’t a place to take a ten year old – it was just crusty old men and they used to smoke and drink at band practice.’
But music was in her blood. Her grandmother was a piano teacher, so she learned piano and sang in choirs.
Later, in Toowoomba, when Leanne’s children started playing brass, she finally got back to her roots and picked up a tenor horn, the brass band equivalent of a French horn. She hasn’t looked back.
These days the Ballina Shire Concert Band is made up of men and women of all ages, united by the love of music. If the beautiful sounds coming out of the packed rehearsal room on Wednesday night are anything to go by, it’s going to be a wonderful celebration concert on the weekend.
Band leader Laurie Green says, ‘Buy your tickets. Tell your family. Tell your friends. Make sure everybody you know comes along!’
More information and tickets are available here. The 140th anniversary concert starts at 3pm on Saturday.
