The Whit Friday Marches are often referred to as “the best free show on earth”. So why do only brass band aficionados and residents of the Pennine villages know about it? This year 126 bands travelled from all over Europe to compete in this annual competition and the Charles Church Camberley Band (CCCB) was amongst them.

This extravaganza of brass banding starts at 4pm and continues until about midnight on Whit Friday every year. The bands each have a coach to transport them and their supporters to some of the 20 villages that host events. The idea is to compete in as many villages as time allows by playing two marches – one on the move and the second march on a stage. The coach drivers are amazing and many are as enthusiastic about transporting their band to as many venues as possible during the evening as the bands are about competing. The drivers weave around the Pennine’s narrow roads with great aplomb and good spirits. You could be given to believe that the competition is actually between the drivers rather than the bands.

However, a band contest it is. On arrival at a village a “runner” is deployed to register the band’s presence. In turn, each of the bands marches in formation whilst playing a march – no mean feat, I can tell you! CCCB was led along the route by a pint sized Nellie as they played “Nellie the Elephant” at the six venues.

The part of Nellie was enthusiastically taken by Hector Johnson (3 years), son of two of the players in CCCB, wearing his Nellie the Elephant onesie. Remarkably, he completed all 6 marches before falling asleep in the middle of the road – job done.

The second part of the competition takes place on whatever the village has managed to nominate as a stage. The bands play a more complex march upon which they are judged by an expert in brass band music. To ensure fair play, the judging is blind. Bands of all abilities take part in the competition, allowing the less experienced bands to test their performance against the experts. Some of the competitions are restricted to particular sections (like the divisions in a football league) To their credit, playing “Castell Caerffili”, CCCB impressed the judge at Greenfield who placed them 3rd in their section– a great result guys!

After such tremendous success, Charles Church Camberley Band could be heading north again next year for another fantastic musical experience.

Tim and Becki have both done extremely well in their exams this year (A levels and GCSEs respectively), gaining top grades enabling to go on to do exactly what they want to next, and deservedly making them very proud of themselves.

Tim is set to go and study Maths and German at Leeds University very soon, so unfortunately during term-time we will have to say goodbye to him, but of course we hope to see him back in the holidays!
Becki is set to continue her studies at Farnborough Sixth Form College in Maths and Physics.

Well done to both of them!

Louise Lloyd, one of our Euphonium players, graduated yesterday with a PhD in Statistics from the University of Southampton. For the last 5 years, as well as squeezing in work, and the all-important band engagements, she has managed to find the time to research the analysis of road accident data. Louise has kindly offered to have a long and in-depth conversation about her thesis ‘Modelling Trends in Road Accident Frequency – Bayesian Inference for Rates with Unknown Exposure’, but has yet to find a volunteer! In the meantime she now has no more excuses for not practising the Euphonium part for Bohemian Rhapsody!

We offer Louise hearty congratulations for this achievement.

The band congratulates horn player David Giles on recently gaining his Masters degree.

David studied for a BA(Hons) in Politics and Law for three years at the University of Essex, graduating on the Colchester campus in 2011. He then undertook an additional year to complete an LLM (Master of Laws) at the University of Reading in International Law and World Order, graduating in December 2012.

He is currently doing temp work whilst applying for more permanent positions. Ultimately, he would love to end up working for the UN or the Foreign Office, particularly as he specialised in Nuclear Disarmament during his Masters.

Well done David!

(If that isn’t enough, he is the latest recruit to the committee where he does sterling work for the band behind the scenes!)

The morning of June 1st 2012 dawned, bright, sunny and early once again for those of us in Charles Church Camberley Band off on our second trip to the Oldham area for the Whit Marches contests.

Once again, it was a fantastic experience for all involved (the sensation of being part of a little-known band marching down the High Street at Delph with a huge crows cheering us on is not to be quickly forgotten once experienced…)

Again we visited seven villages, several we’d been to on our last visit, but some new; and this time we had a novelty march to play too, “Chicken Run” arranged for us espcially by Owen Lloyd.

After a busy afternoon and evening of jumping on and off the bus, marching, playing the contest march and then doing the same all over again at the next village, we returned to our hotel, exhausted but happy and contented. Once more it had been a fun-packed event for us.

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The band was delighted to hear that trombone player David Pitts has been offered a place at the prestigious Royal College of Music in London.

Along with his parents Karen (Solo Horn) and Bob (Solo Cornet), David joined the Charles Church Camberley Band in 2009, and has skilfully balanced commitments with this band, playing for the Hampshire County Youth Band and all his other studies.

David progressed from the cornet to the trombone 10 years ago (once his arms were long enough), and he also plays the piano and ukelele. He starts his four year course next September.

We wish him every success in the future and look forward to welcoming him back from time to time. (Apparently Solo Trombone player Alan Johnson is trying to develop a bigger sound to help fill the gap!!)

Friday 4th November dawned with dark storm clouds and pouring rain, an inauspicious start for the day of the wedding of two of the band’s players. But the sun appeared in time for the marriage of Louise Walter, the band’s most beautiful Euphonium player, to the versatile musician, Owen Lloyd, who is equally at home on the cornet as with the big drum and the gong. Naturally, music featured strongly in the service, with Louise’s brother Edward playing the organ, and friends providing trumpet accompaniment and a quartet during the signing of the register. The service was over by 2pm – no excuse for missing the regular Friday night practice then!!

Charles Church Camberley Band are celebrating recent success at the Southern Counties Amateur Band Association Autumn Contest, held in Folkestone annually.

The band played Goff Richards’ Saddleworth Festival Overture and was delighted when the three strong bass section Les, Ian and Bryan was crowned the Best Bass section of the five bands competing in our section. The trio won the Roy Whitten Memorial Trophy which has special significance to the band as Roy Whitten was a member of the band until recently.

Roy Whitten spent fifteen years with the band playing Bb and then Eb bass. As well as being one of the most reliable members of the band he was also a very active committee member until just a few months before he passed away in August 2008.

At the SCABA 2009 Contest, Roy’s wife Kitty, presented the trophy for the Best Bass section and we are delighted that this trophy has come home.

In May, Charles Church Camberley Band began the celebrations at the beginning of their 50th year with a visit to the Whit Friday marches in the Saddleworth and Oldham region, near Manchester.

Around 130 brass bands gathered to take part in the annual Whit Friday marches, from local youth bands to the top bands in the UK including Black Dyke and Brighouse & Rastrick. Each band visited a number of villages, marching down the street before playing a march to a professional adjudicator who ranked them in relation to the other competing bands, based on their musicality.

CCCB enjoyed beautiful weather for their very first visit to these contests which started at Stalybridge Celtic football club at around 4pm and finished at the iconic Delph (made famous in the hit film Brassed Off) at around 10pm, as well as visiting Friezland, Uppermill, Diggle, Dobcross and Carrbrook during the evening.

Robert Cherry, our musical director said ‘This was a fantastic opportunity for Charles Church Camberley Band to get out on the road and experience playing to thousands of people. The band has made great progress over the last few months and we really enjoyed the fantastic crowds, electric atmosphere and the chance to meet up with old friends in the brass banding community.’