1998:
BTB Year in Review Pt.1
Shorter than next year's cos not much happened
The year started for many of us with the traditional East Sussex Brass residential course and concert in February, which this year was conducted by Roy Newsome and featured Faireys bass-player Shaun Crowther as guest soloist (see elsewhere on this site for details of the 1999 course).
The band had its first concert of the year in April with the annual SCABA Spring Contest in Brighton, where we won third prize in the Third Section and sulked for a few weeks. Following this, there was a parade through Battle on St. George's Day for the local scouts and guides. During the course of a busy Summer programme the band performed Bandstand Concerts at Worthing, Bexhill, Boulogne (le band day out), Alexandra Park (Hastings), Deal and finally Eastbourne in October (A tad cold if you're stuck on the end, I can assure you!). We played at Catsfield and Claverham Fetes, as well as giving three concerts on Battle Bandstand and getting sunburnt playing in the grounds of Hever Castle on August Bank Holiday Monday. A soggy time was had by all when various band members (in a display of true British Bulldog spirit) insisted on leading Battle's Rememberance Day Parade despite the weather, when maybe staying in the tearooms for just one more hot chocolate might have made more sense.
The festive season saw several concerts, the first of which was in Staplecross, where former Principal Cornet Dean Pelling took up the baton at short notice (looking a little worried at times too!) and none of us won a single prize in the WI Quilt raffle - about which many of us were greatly relieved. A fund-raising concert for the Macmillan Nurses followed at Battle Abbey, where Peter enjoyed sampling the beer. We then sent a small ensemble to play carols in the dark at the annual rather-muddy follow-the-donkey nativity-festival at Whatlington, where this year Joseph and Mary finally had a donkey again (albeit cunningly disguised as a pony), and we all burnt our mouths on the soup just as we do with painful monotony every year. The band also played carols in a garage for the residents of a dark, cold Westfield village (in return for more soup of course), for the British Legion in Battle, and around the wards of the local Hospital. Ironically some of us nearly ended up being the recipients of these last carols as I very cleverly managed to redesign my Mini radically and forcefully on the way to the hospital...
Our own Christmas concert went rather well, although we say so ourselves. A bumper audience turned out and packed the hall - which is always nice, even if it confuses the band a bit - and the fancy dress seemed to be very well received as per usual. I imagine there will be pictures on the site before long (yeah, I always say that...sorry!), but for the meantime let's just say that there was an inordinate number of fishnet stockings on show...The annual Civil Service Christmas bash in Hastings also went down well (along with copious volumes of alcoholic beverages, several packs of party poppers and a can of fake snow - as well as two cans of silly string to "decorate" the front-row cornets). This year's chaos (um...I mean...concert) was a special one as it was Bob Shoesmith's last attempt at trying to control us before retiring from band life to concentrate on his work committments. The whole band would like to say a big "thank you" to Bob for his services over the 22 years that he has conducted us at the club, and wish him every success for the future.
CONGRATULATIONS
went to 1998's award winners...Jayne Thunder, our Principal Tenor Horn, won
the inaugural Keith Child Shield - kindly donated in memory of Keith, who used
to play Bass for us, by his widow.
Claire Mitchell won the 1998 award for most-improved young player/outstanding
contribution to the band. However, before you cry "Fix" (like when
Mrs Mitchell Senior won all of the Christmas raffle prizes the year before...),
Claire was the unanimous choice of the band committee for turning up to EVERY
concert during the year without moaning (*apparently there is a stewards enquiry
about the moaning bit*).