We had a “blow out the cobwebs and have some fun” rehearsal this evening and ‘eased’ into the new year with light touch run throughs of Suite Gothique, The Padstow Lifeboat, Spectrum and Mephistopheles. 

​Band Chairman, Kevin, who led this evening’s rehearsal, reflecting on 2024 said: “A good year for the Lydney Band organisation. We will try our hardest to make 2025 even more fun.”

As we reach the end of 2024, we would like to wish everyone a very Happy New Year and extend our thanks for the ongoing support we have from across the local community and beyond. This year has been one of continued development and success across Lydney Town Band, Lydney Training Band and the Lydney Starter Group!

Throughout 2024, the Town Band proudly represented Lydney on the contesting stage, achieving our first outright contest win in over twenty years at the Wychavon Festival of Brass, taking Third Place in the Third Section of the WEBBA Regional Championships in March and qualifying for the National Championships of Great Britain, and retaining the Best Percussion Section Award at the GBBA Own Choice Contest.

Our fabulous Training Band also returned to the GBBA Own Choice Contest in November, winning their section and retaining their Gold Standard Award. The Starter Group has continued to provide the ideal onboarding point for aspiring musicians and in Spring, undertook a showcase tour of the area's residential homes. Players from both groups also enjoyed success at the Bailey Lane End Festival during the summer! We were also able to celebrate the enormous contribution that Roger and Ken Powell have made to the Training Band and Starter Group, when the pair were shortlisted for the Brass Bands England 2024 Services to Youth Award.

Special shout outs go to the team that undertook the Severn Bridge 10k and the Portishead 10k to help raise money for new instruments; to Louise and Matt for brilliantly portraying the protagonists of our Wychavon entry: The Tale of the Princess and the Dragon, as well as Adrian for his deft trombone work at the story's climatic finale; to the Town Band's Musical Director, Thomas Dunne, for his incredible work in helping us achieve our contesting successes; and to Kevin and Kerry Ford for all of their hard work in the continuing development of the Training Band!
​
Onwards to 2025!!!

We’ve ended our epic 2024 Christmas carolling season on home turf, bringing some last minute festive cheer to the customers of Tesco Lydney!
​
Many thanks to everyone who has donated, said hello, sang along and even taken a turn conducting our ensembles. A big shout out to our incredible collectors, ensemble conductors and the people working behind the scenes to bring everything together across the Lydney Starter Group, Lydney Training Band and Lydney Town Band!

We’ve had one heck of a Christmas epic this weekend!

On Friday evening, a small Town Band ensemble brought some festive entertainment to The Huntsman Hotel in Shirenewton. On Saturday, we had an ensemble of Lydney Town and Training Band players take a turn on the stage at the Taurus Crafts’ Christmas market and today, we’ve had a two Town Band ensembles bringing festive cheer to the shoppers of Monmouth Waitrose, before this evening Lydney Training Band performed at the St Mary’s Church Christmas Carol Service! (Thanks to Rich and Ian for some of these great photos!)

Only three days until Christmas!

Only one week to go until Christmas! We started this week with some more community carolling, visiting Primrose Hill and Lychgate Mews on Monday evening! Shout out to Kerry, Richard and Tim for these great photos and to Beth for her incredible outfit!
​
Next up! On Thursday, we will be appearing at the Carols at the Bandstand event in Bathurst Park, starting at 4:30pm. There will be mince pies, mulled wine and a special appearance from the Lydney Gospel Choir!

We’ve had a very busy second half of the week - on Wednesday, we took a festive tour of Lydney’s residential homes visiting Goode Court and Rodley House; on Saturday we had a double feature with a Town Band ensemble playing at the Brockweir & Hewelsfield Play Area and Lydney Training Band returning to perform with Chepstow Male Voice Choir’s Christmas concert; and today, we had two teams spreading Christmas joy at Tesco in Chepstow!
​
Only ten days to go until Christmas!!!

​First weekend of Christmas activities - COMPLETE!
​
Lydney Training Band brought some festive musical cheer to the Lydney Lights Switch-On on Saturday! We also had ensembles of Town and Training Band players (plus some helpers - thanks Julia and Duncan!) performing in Monmouth, Taurus Crafts and Primrose Hill School!!!

The Lydney Town and Training Band Christmas Schedule is here!

On Sunday 8th December, Lydney Town Band will returning to the Mount of Olives Church, Coleford for their Christmas Concert. On Saturday 14th December, the Chepstow Male Voice Choir have kindly invited Lydney Training Band to perform as part of their annual Christmas Concert. The Training Band will also be perfroming at the St Mary's Church Christmas Carol Service, in Lydney, on Sunday 22nd!

We’ve also got loads of opportunities to see us at our community carolling sessions! It's going to be a busy one and we can't wait to see as many of you as possible!

Enormous congratulations to our fantastic percussion team (incl. Jenny, not pictured) who won the Haydyn Evans Trophy for Best Percussion Section for the second year in a row at today’s GBBA Contest!

​In addition, as the sole Third Section band in the contest, we also retained the Maxie Cup and the A.R. Watkins Cup for Best March and Best Test Piece. Massive thank you to organisers for a brilliantly run contest day!

We kicked the carolling season off early this week following a special request from the Azalea Memory Cafe in Lydney! It was an absolute pleasure to perform for their group. Thanks to Julia and Duncan for stepping in to help out!

A few ‘behind the scenes’ photos from last weekend’s incredible experience at the Wychavon Festival of Brass. Thanks to Louise, Emma, Kay and River for helping capture these lovely shots of the day!

What a weekend!
​
Our win in the Third Section of the Wychavon Festival of Brass on Saturday represented the band’s first outright win at a contest in 22 years! We can’t thank our Musical Director, Thomas Dunne, enough for all of his hard work over the last few weeks and months in developing The Tale of the Princess and the Dragon and working with the band to create a musical fairytale!

The set featured three original arrangements and compositions. Wild Mountain Thyme and Princess and the Dragon, both written by Tom, gave our flugel player, Louise, and our bass trombonist, Matt, a chance to demonstrate their incredible talents, as well as showcasing those of our bass and percussion teams. Massive shout out to Malcolm, who wrote There Will Come Soft Rains, a superbly emotive piece that set up the story’s finale, which featured a trombone solo from Adrian!
​
Huge thanks to the organisers of the contest and everyone who came to support us on the day and who have been supporting the players in the background Thanks also to Emma, Mark and Neil for these great photos

It’s not long until we present The Tale of Princess and the Dragon at this weekend’s Wychavon Festival of Brass! Here’s a couple of shots from last night’s rehearsal courtesy of Tom.