The set work, “Viking Age” by Thierry Deleruyelle was a piece the band thoroughly enjoyed getting to grips with through a great intensive rehearsal weekend in Pitlochry at the end of August, but unfortunately our performance - while favoured by the press and audience - wasn’t enough for the adjudicators. With stiff competition from some of the best brass bands in the country we finished 14th out of 18.
#finals2019 S3: We are on a high quality run of performances of Viking Age with @PerthshireBrass adding to the tally. This was high on excitement and energy with big, bold sounds and so much in the way of contrasts.
— Brass Band World (@BBWMagazine) September 15, 2019
Pleased with our performance regardless, we took comfort in beating several bands expected to best us going into the contest, including Valley Brass who won the North West Regionals, and Irvine & Dreghorn who topped our section at the Scottish earlier this year.
Our chairman Euan was delighted at the social element of the weekend where some of our newer members of the band were made to feel very welcome and have settled into the Perthshire Brass family very quickly.
There were other reasons to celebrate however, offering our congratulations to Unison Kinneill who last Saturday became the first Scottish band ever to win the Nationals’ 1st Section. It was also a weekend for celebrating non-band related things as the weekend prior, two of our players, Joseph and Bronia tied the knot at a beautiful wedding in Buxton. We wish Mr and Mrs Denton a very happy and loving marriage together.
Perthshire Brass now look forward to hitting the ground running with a home turf contest next, the Band Supplies Scottish Challenge at Perth Concert Hall on November 30th, and look forward to competing in the second section early next year, where we will make our presence known.