East of England Co-op Band

Remembrance is always a busy time of year, for cornet players in particular.  This year was especially poignant as 5 East of England Co-op players travelled to France at the beginning of November and were proud to represent the East of England Co-op Band within a massed band of players from multiple bands across Eastern England, known as  ‘Anglia Brass’.

 Whilst in France, the Last Post and Sonnerie Aux Morts (French Last Post) was performed by Georgi at the Villers Bocage Cemetery in a joint Anglo-French remembrance service.  Simon performed the Last Post in a further moving ceremony at Naours Church.

 Back on British soil, a total of 7 further Last Posts have been played by players, one of which by Steve Anstead at Southend United’s Roots Hall was shown live on TV and streamed across the world on TikTok.

The Band made the long journey to Desford, near Leicester, on Sunday 26th October for the Leicestershire Brass Band Association own choice contest. Our MD Mark Ager had chosen George Lloyd’s “Diversions on a Bass theme” for our test piece and his knowledge and experience with this piece helped the band immensely in our preparations.

The band were pleased with their performance but you never know with contesting and the final band to play, Elland, certainly put in a strong performance with another George Lloyd piece (English Heritage) so we were by no means complacent. However when Elland were announced as runners up we knew we were in with a chance of a win and the confirmation of this was greeted by jubilant celebrations by the majority of the band and our supporters who stayed behind to wait for the results.

MD Mark went on stage to collect the huge winner’s shield from Paul Norley who told Mark that he really liked our approach and the orchestral sound and style needed for George Lloyd’s music.

The written comments from Paul Norley concluded as follows:

“Clearly a band of real quality with some excellent individual contributions….a convincing, well directed and very musical performance”

The band were jubilant afterwards and this was a great reward following months of hard work put in. Our bass section particularly enjoyed the adjudicator’s comment that they were “Nimble and full of panache”!