New school year, new faces, new challenges (2/9/09)

Tewit return to action tonight as the summer holidays draw to a close. With 8 players having moved on at the end of the year, Tewit are excited to welcome Ed Dennis (percussion), Sammy Rawson (baritone) and Tim Hurst (bass trombone) to the band. There are also vacancies to be filled in cornet and horn positions as graduates from the Intermediate Band are being auditioned. There is also a fresh face in the principal cornet seat this year. After a succession of male principals, Emily Larwood is to be the first female principal of Tewit Youth Band in 17 years. In other solo positions, Luke Galloway takes over on Solo Horn, Steve Jones remains Solo Trombone, Izzy Newbery remains on Flugel and Rory Megginson stays on Solo Euphonium. There is an exciting program of concerts, competitions and social events this year to culminate in a senior band tour of the Black Forest, Germany in 2010.

Tewit win at Harrogate Music Festival (15/3/09)

Tewit emerged victorious from the Brass/Concert Band class of the 2009 Harrogate Music Festival beating off fierce competition from local schools. An extremely entertaining program of Stingray, Padstow Lifeboat, South Pacific Medley and Valero captured the imagination of the audience and many consider it Tewit's best performance of the year.

Starting off with a thunderous percussion break in Stingray while the rest of the band walked on, the audience was immediately drawn in with a mixture of exciting runs and stylish playing leading up to an furious climax. Moving onto Padstow Lifeboat the audience were treated to a classic brass band piece featuring Ric Askew and Joe Martin on Sop and the band's foghorn was noticeable throughout. The band showed great attention to detail and dynamic contrast while the storm raged and the foghorn blew.

Next we took a trip back to the 50's with Roger and Hammerstein's South Pacific Medley featuring Rory Megginson and Nathan Wake on Euphonium and Cornet respectively in 'Some Enchanted Evening'. The band produced some lovely sounds and delicate playing as the song grew to a moving finale. The medley continued with the 'surprise element' to the performance as the 'men' of the band moved to centre stage to belt out a wonderful rendition of 'There is Nothing Like a Dame' in the role of some American sailors lamenting the lack of female company. Accompanied well by the females of the band the men proceeded to steal the show with some brilliant vocal work, featuring Steve Jones, and some highly entertaining actions culminating with some jazz hands and a well deserved stage bow as they received their applause.

From then on it was all hands to the pumps as the drums started up for Valero. The band proceeded to arrange themselves into a slightly more 'jazzy' order with the cornets stood around the back of the rest of the band seated in 2 rows. A splendid fusion of funky rhythms and unison actions produced a vibrant performance with a great Jazz Flugel solo by Chris Williamson. Valero thrilled the audience all the way through till the final bars where the whole band rose to finish the piece standing with bells in the air.

All that was left after that was to wait for the results, and after strong performances from St. John Fisher's and St. Aidan's, the decision could go any way. However, Tewit emerged triumphant gaining honours and taking home the shield for the 8th year in a row and the 20th time in their history. Conductor Craig Ratcliffe was quite justified in praising the band for their fantastic performance and we hope this will inspire Tewit to great things at the Nationals in Manchester on April 5th.

Quiz Night on Friday 23rd January (9/1/09)

As a fund raiser for the band, Jo Wood has organized a quiz night in Ripley Town Hall on Friday 23rd of January. Tickets will cost £10 per head to include fish 'n' chips from "Dougies". The quiz will be from 7.30pm till 10.30pm with numbers limited to 60 made up of teams of 6 maximum. You can make your own or join one on the night.

Tickets available on a first come first served basis from Jo Wood on 01423 567746. Or see her at band rehearsals.

Carol Playing Xmas 08 (9/1/09)

After 2 weekends in Marks and Spencers and 2 days playing in Harrogate Market Place, the combined efforts of all the Tewit groups raised a record £4622.23. A big thanks to all members and parents who contributed and made it possible. We hope to raise even more in Xmas 2009!!

Tewit Workshop, Social and Sleepover a success!! (6/1/09)

Tewit held an all day workshop out at Huby with a social in the evening and a sleepover in the bandroom after that. The workshop started slowly but once everyone warmed up we got off to a flyer and really got to work on the program for the Action Research Contest in Blackpool on February 1st. A selection of 5 very different pieces have now been chosen and include lots of cheese and a little bit of brass band. The band then split into sections for the sectionals in which parts were practised over and over and certain cornet players were subjected to good humoured teasing by the sectional leader!! The band then came together for a final blow through and the improvement was both noticable and vast. Things are looking good for the Blackpool contest as we try to beat the 11th out 14 places we acheived on our debut last year. A big thankyou to Craig for putting up with us all day and giving his time to make a big difference to the band's playing.

Then things took a lighter tone moving into the evening as the social got into full swing and the band watched, with great hilarity, the premiere of the Prague Tour 2008 DVD while tucking into baked potato and chile con carne provided by Jo Wood and her team of helpers. Then the devastatingly difficult quiz followed with categories on entertainment, sport, music, general knowledge, celebrity photos and chocolate with the Euphatones (Rory, Kate and Rhiannon) emerging victorious. Later on there were party games; a highly amusing selection of games designed to inflict as much humiliation as possible on people. The apple game was won by the team of Trombones, Euphs, Baris, Basses and Drums, but full credit to Gabby for her enthusiasm!! The poker chip game always goes down well and the Cornets and Horns triumphed this time. A highly competitive and bruising game of musical chairs was next on the agenda with many people bashed and floored in the process. Eventually Sally was the victor but a fine display of violence and destruction from Rory will be remembered in the bruises he handed out to those who got in his way!! The ongoing table tennis doubles tournament set up by Graham King was settled with a titanic final of Nathan and Keiron up against Brunty and Phil which was won by Nathan and Keiron 21-15.

Then after hot chocolate and prize giving it was time for the sleepover (or lack of sleep over). Praise is well deserved for the adults who agreed to stay over and supervise knowing full well they wouldn't be getting a good nights rest. There were a lot of bleary eyed faces in the morning and the cold band members gratefully tucked into the toast and bacon sandwiches provided by some very very nice parents. A big thankyou to band reps Steve, Nathan and Gabby for organising and running the social.

For photos click here

New Bandroom is Here! (31/10/08)

We are pleased to announce that the Tewit Bandroom was officially opened on September 20th and is now fully in use by all 4 bands. The bandroom has been bought for us by a kind benefactor, and in its previous life, used to be an old Methodist Church. Fortunately for Tewit, the building was put up for sale at the beginning of the year, and now has been fully converted (at no expense to Tewit!) into an all singing and dancing rehearsal space that can accomodate all 4 bands at once, and a seperate room/kitchen for parents to wait and drink lots of coffee.

New CD release featuring Tewit coming up! (30/10/08)

The band recently were recorded on the Harrogate Choral Society Christmas CD which is to be released shortly. Check out this page for information

Bands Announced for 2008-2009 (30/10/08)

The Tewit Youth Band is pleased to announce its full band membership list for the coming year. Full details of the Senior Band can be found here, other bands to follow as soon as possible.

Band to perform in Fanfare for Royal Hall Concert (30/10/08)

On the 28th of November the band will be performing in the recently opened Royal Hall in a grand concert alongside other local groups. The concert promises to be a great evening of entertainment with tickets available from the HIC box office.

Touring Germany and The Czech Republic (10/08/08)

For their bi-annual tour, Tewit travelled across Europe to Prague for a week long tour of the city and the surrounding area. The trip also took in a night stop in Cologne in Germany on the way there, and on the way back, ensuring that we really did make the most of our journey. The band performed in five seperate concerts including the Collonades at Karlovy Vary, a spa town not too disimilar to Harrogate and St. Nicholas Church in the Old Square in Prague. The tour was a massive success, a full report should follow sometime in the future.

Tewit Claim Silver at Nationals (13/04/08)

After setting off at 7.30 in the morning to meet our early arrival time at the RNCM in Manchester, the band produced a fantastic performance to claim a Silver award in the National Youth Brass Band Championships. In a massive section of 17 bands, Tewit drew the number 3 draw and had to make an impact on adjudicators Simone Rebello and James Scott. The programme of Just a Closer Walk, The Armed Man and Peter Grahams' Dimensions was called committed and impressive in the remarks, and reflected well the hard work the band has put into rehearsals over the past month. Special mention goes to Tom Lilley and Alasdair Frater who both led well in the set test, and to Steve Jones for jazzing it up in Just a Closer Walk! A huge thanks also goes to Louise Codling for helping us out on Baritone for this contest. To read the remarks click here.

Brassed Off and hitting the headlines!

Although the band was tremendously grateful to be asked to perform for Prince Charles at the opening of the Royal Hall last month, the event was overshadowed by a ridiculous legislation that was enforced upon the band just days before the event. Under North Yorkshire County Council guidelines, every member of the band had to apply for a licence to allow them to perform at the opening, only after completing a lengthy document, accompanied by signatures from their own school's headteacher, a photograph and a copy of their Birth Certificate. We were left with no option but to comply with this pointless beaurocracy, but in the weeks following the event, the band has received support from a number of places-including HRH Prince Charles himself. You can read a full article on the Yorkshire Post website. Click here to view

Trip to Marrick (04/02/08)

For the fourth year running the band visited Marrick Priory in Swaledale for their annual residential weekend. As well as spending a time rehearsing music for the coming Action Research competition in Blackpool, the band had a great time doing lots of different activities. You can see the pictures from the weekend here.

Royal Performance (22/01/08)

The band was delighted to play at the newly opened Royal Hall on 22nd January 2008. Over 300 invited guests were present at the concert, along with HRH Prince Charles, who spoke at length about his interest in the halls restoration and his love of the town. The band performed a number of pieces to the guests whilst waiting for the Royal Party to arrive and played in a short concert with the St. Aidans Chamber Choir and award winning choristers Emma Whitely and William Dutton. Not only did the band feature in the local press and radio, but made the news bulletins on BBC and ITV too! Pictures to follow later.

New CD - 'Bright Spark' on sale now! (22/01/08)

The bands new CD is finally on sale to the general public. You can check out the CD here, with details of the tracks, samples to listen to and information on how to purchase here.

New Members!

The band has been extremely fortunate this year to have a number of players move up from the Junior band to the Senior, and likewise in the Training band a number of promotions happened. We were also delighted that in the first week of the new year, a massive 8 new players arrived to start at the Training band with conductors Steve and Kathryn. They'll certainly have their hands full! We are also pleased to welcome Jack Grainger to the tuba section, who is going to travel from Richmond (nearly 40 miles away!) to play with the band. Check out the Senior band page for an up-to-date list of playing members. 22/01/08