The Royal New Zealand Navy Band this last week visited the Coromandel Peninsula as part of a regional tour. They performed a series of free, one-hour – some outdoor – community and school concerts that featured traditional march tunes, generation-spanning pop songs and Maori music. Several solo instrumentalists were featured top level.
These schools were the fortunate venues – Waihi College, Whangamata, Mercury Bay and Coromandel Area Schools, Thames Highschool and Hauraki Plains College.
The band also presented two outdoor concerts which were free and open to the public. Whitianga’s concert was at the Albert Street Centre Plaza and Thames’ concert was outside the War Memorial Civic Centre.
There were twenty very polished band musicians, three conductors who took turns conducting but also played an instrument, and also some excellent vocalists. This variety plus a drum kit rather than marching drums as well as a percussion section contributed some terrific dimensions to the Royal New Zealand Navy Band’s music.
They delighted every audience. One regret was that not enough of the public knew about their visit. At the concert The Informer attended, Priscila Scanlon was the young conductor. She had recently been overseas and completed training at His Majesty’s Royal Marines School of Music in their Higher Training Department doing a Bandmaster’s Course.
This treat for this region was all part of a promotion of the Royal New Zealand Navy – many opportunities for study and careers for senior students at our colleges and that has to be good for New Zealand.
