Wollongong City Brass & Wind Bands

Our Junior Wind Band is playing great music and sounding fantastic, but we need more players!

If you are/know/are-related-to someone under 19 who plays a wind instrument (e.g. flute, clarinet, saxophone, trumpet, trombone) or percussion, we’d love to have you/them join our band. We’d also like to start up a beginner band for kids who are new to their instruments.

The Junior Wind Band is a great way for kids who play in school bands to extend their skills and get performance experience. It’s great fun, and we’ve got some exciting events coming up later in the year including a tour to Newcastle, concerts and playouts.

You can find out more about joining, and our rehearsal times here on the web site. Get in touch!

Last night’s brass rehearsal saw the new beginner brass group receive their loan instruments and make their first sounds as a band. It’s fair to say that there was a lot of excitement amongst the kids, and perhaps some feelings of trepidation amongst the parents. You’ll have to trust us on this, learning how to make a good sound on a brass instrument takes time, those sounds will get better!

The process of learning how to read and play music begins in earnest next week, and so (we hope!) will the practice at home.

Happy playing everyone!

If you or your kids have ever wanted to learn a brass instrument, there’s no better time to start than now!

We’re about to start a new group of musicians catering for first-timers. The beginner group will meet on Fridays from 5 to 5:30pm during school terms. It’s mainly aimed at kids, but adults are welcome too. Kids must be in Year 4 at school, or older.

The best part? The annual fee is only $40, and we’ll loan you an instrument
(subject to availability, of course) at no extra cost. That’s right, for just $40 you get a weekly group lesson, and a brass instrument to play for the whole year.

The information session is on Friday 1 March 2019 at 5pm in the band hall. For more information, contact Des Cannings (des.cannings@gmail.com or call 0431 065 359). Instruments will run out, so get in early!

Our “As Time Goes By” concert last weekend brought together our Brass and Wind bands at a single concert for the first time ever, but that wasn’t the only exciting thing that happened on the day.

We were also thrilled to be able to acknowledge the outstanding contributions of some of our members with the prestigious award of Life Membership of the band.

Awards went to Fay Craig and Lindsay Dunstan for their dedication and service to the band both as players and committee members over many years, and to Leanne Walton for her hard work as Musical Director of the 3 Wind bands (beginner, junior, and senior). Leanne is the first ever recipient of Life Membership from the Wind band side of the organisation.

Congratulations to Leanne, Lindsay and Fay!

Now that 2019 is in full swing, school is back, and we can all finally focus on our New Year’s Resolutions (they start in February, right?!) there’s no better time to get involved in music.

If your children are getting back to school and thinking about joining the school band, or just starting music lessons, they can come and join one of our beginner or junior bands and play a brass or wind instrument.

It’s going to be a big year for our junior bands. The junior brass have just kicked off 2019 with their annual camp. After just a couple of days they are producing some exceptional music (they had a lot of fun as well, of course). Further ahead, there will be concerts, competitions, workshops, and hopefully a short tour!

We’re always looking for new players in our adult bands as well. If you play a brass or wind instrument or you’d like to learn one, give us a call on 4228 6018 (please, leave a message!). You can find our rehearsal times and instruments here on the web site.

We’re celebrating the 2019 Seniors Festival by bringing together our flagship brass and wind bands for our first combined concert. We’ll be covering a lot of musical territory, we’ve got music by Percy Grainger, The Seekers, ABBA, and Queen. Oh, and Sinatra, and Paul Simon… And let’s not forget Elvis…! There’s bound to be a few (maybe more than a few) that you can sing along to!

The concert is on 16 February 2019 at 2pm in the Figtree Anglican Church Auditorium on Gibson Rd. You can pre-purchase tickets at http://www.trybooking.com/BAGDK.

We hope you can join us for a musical stroll down memory lane!

Back for the 5th year running, the Honk Street Music Festival is coming to Wollongong this weekend. The festival runs from January 10 to 12, showcasing bands and street music around central Wollongong. It’s always fun, so why not get out there and listen to some music?

The City of Wollongong Wind Band will be taking part in the festival with a performance on Saturday 12 January, although we’re not exactly sure when or where yet, so stay tuned!

UPDATE: We’re performing at the Arts Precinct (next to IPAC) from 10:00am to 10:30am.

To help bring in 2019, the Brass Band will be playing a set at Osborne Park in Wollongong (on Cliff Rd, opposite the harbour and La Vendi’s). We’re performing from about 5:30pm to 6:00pm on New Year’s Eve, so if you’re near Wollongong Harbour for the festivities, stop by and enjoy the program, it’ll be fun!

All our bands will be back in 2019 for another year of concerts, marches, and competitions.

Have a happy (and safe) New Year!

Our end of year Brass Band concert is fast approaching, come and join us on 24 November at the Figtree Anglican Church Auditorium for a fantastic afternoon of music. The program has something for everyone, so we’ve named the concert “Brass Band Allsorts”.

We’ll also be featuring a few pieces performed by our fabulous Junior Band, including some of their own arrangements of popular music. The concert will also be the first public performance for this year’s Beginner Brass Band who are looking forward to showing the incredible progress they’ve made in their first year of brass playing.

Afternoon tea will be provided, and we’ll be holding a raffle with some great prizes.

Hope to see you there!

We’re pleased to announce that the Brass Band has a new Musical Director, with Jonathan Gatt officially taking over the reins. Jonathan has been our caretaker MD for the past year, and we’ve all appreciated the time and effort he has put in, and also for sharing some of his vast experience in music and brass bands in particular.

We look forward to working with Jonathan in our quest to become the best musicians – and the best band – that we can be!

Welcome aboard!