Newsletter.

This year sees the band celebrate 40 years with Norman Pendray as their principle Cornet. This firm rock in stormy seas has enabled the band to survive and thrive where other bands have stumbled. Norman joined the Band at the grand old age of 12, walking the two miles each way to Band practice and following a long tradition of Pendrays in St Pinnock Band. Joe Armstrong then took the band as conductor, having been a Euphonium star with Grimethorpe Band, Norman made steady progress under his tutelage and was appointed to solo cornet in 1969 at just 17 years of age. He was part of the 1977 West of England Champion Quartet
and was offered a position with Grimethorpe
Band. Fortunately for St Pinnock Norman had
a farm to run, which meant milking 120 cows
twice a day, contest or not.

Norman has also taken up the conductors
baton in his time and conducted the band,
and Bodmin Band. His work with St Pinnock
Junior Band brought forward some excellent
players who are still with the band today.

In 1975 Norman married Fiona Whitehead, a horn player with the band, to produce the Bands first in-house wedding

The great bandsman George Thompson taught Norman about practicing with a suspended cornet to improve technique and put less pressure on his lips, we all very much hope that there are plenty more years in those lips yet.

This month found the band working hard to prepare a new programme for the summer and its Bodmin Concert in particular. Jeremy had the band doing a musical intensive Gym workout twice a week to improve stamina and sound. The blood sweat and tears paid off as the band produced one of its best performances ever in the public rooms at Bodmin. Expertly compeered by Phillip Hunt from Radio Cornwall, and supported by the St Germans Singers the band produced some real Gems. Dan Tamblyn gave a faultless rendition of Helter Skelter on the Xylophone, which proved to be a real show stopper. Three rather fetching young ladies from a local religious order then gave the trombone section a rest and treated the audience their version of " I will follow Him" from the movie Sister Act. With other great performances from the horn and cornet sections, we all await what the Bass section will dream up for a future feature.

The Band then went on to start the summer gig sessions by providing a traditional Garden Fete musical back drop to the Heligan Gardens Spring Festival. The Band could be heard the length of the gardens and drew a fair audience on a cold and draughty day. To keep warm, we played a fair number of pieces almost back tp back, and certainly earned our fee, although did not get to look around the gardens

The Band were thrilled to hear the results of this years Gwent Youth Brass Solo competition,where are irrepressible Soprano Cornet player Brendon Caddy won an armful of titles. Not content with first place in the slow melody 12-13 years he also went on to take first place in the air varie 15 years and under , followed by second place in the open slow melody competition : more than enough to earn a mention in dispatches from 4barsrest.
When not taking part in St Pinnock's busy round of engagements, Brendon also occupies the Soprano seat in the National Childrens Brass Band and St Dennis Youth Band. Undoubtedly a name to watch for the future years, the band very much enjoy the presence of a possible future star in their ranks and the entertainment he brings to the ever stoical cornet section.
At a more local level, Brendon's revolutionary patented sheet music filing system was reputed to have enabled him to be the first player to get the next piece of music on his stand on at least one occasion last month. Our Principal cornet is however disputing this.
A special cheer should go to Brendon's parents, who have taken the " Mums Taxi " service to a whole new level
http://www.4barsrest.com/news/detail.asp?=9940

Our heartiest congratulations go to Rachel Crabb, who has just been awarded the prestigious Robert Lewin Scholarship from the organisations, Awards for Young Musicians. This would be fantastic in itself, but is made even more so by the fact that she has undergone two serious spinal ops in the last year and been forced to change from playing Eb Bass to Euphonium. Rachel started playing with the junior band on cornet but found her real talent playing the Bass. As well as being a committed regular player and committee member of St Pinnock, she is in regular demand from other bands to act as Dep, and often plays for St Dennis Youth and Cornwall Youth Brass Band. She has given many fine performances with St Pinnock, playing with a style and composure seldom seen in such a young player.
The audition was in London, and required Rachel to play two contrasting pieces and pass an interview with a panel of trustees. The award is worth £2000 and will set her well on the way to her ambition of making a career out of her musical talents.

With autumn now almost upon us, we can look back with relief at having only lost one job due to the weather this year. A huge improvement over the previous year which saw our finances take a bit of a dent. We have tramped the streets on various carnivals and Flora’s, and probably played that famous Cornish Ditty some thousand or more times. This year we would like to give a big thank you to the Marina Hotel, Fowey, who with great generosity give aid and succour to every passing Bandsman in the Flora and Carnival, by giving them all a drink of cider! We would certainly say that this is a must stay at hotel!

A long awaited development for this autumn is the revival of the Learner and Youth Bands. We have secured the services of a tutor and conductor and hope to be welcoming a new crop of Bandsmen and women. We are still short of a permanent trombone player for either the solo or second seat and would welcome anyone interested in this seat, undoubtedly the most important in the Band.

The Band had a great day out at the Exmouth Entertainment Contest, sadly the adjudicator was obviously having an off day and our enthusiastic performance failed to find favour! Opening with “Lionheart” (Philip Harper), the audience were then treated to “Somewhere out there”(Horner) featuring Emma Jackson on solo horn. “Rolling Thunder” (Fillmore) was a bold gamble, played at breakneck speed. Sharon Banbury on Flugel gave an excellent rendition of Rodrigo’s “Orange Juice” and Dan Tamblyn drew gasps of admiration from the crowd with a xylophone solo, “Helterskelter” . Rounded off with the theme from “Batman the Movie”(Elfman) the band left the stage confident that it had played its best. Our excellent compeer, Chris Hansell, managed a succession of lightning costume changes, witty lines and poetic introductions to give the whole performance a unity and professional feel.
However all good things come to an end, and in the cold light of day (and coming 7th out of 12, bottom of the regular competing bands) we studied the adjudicators remarks and will be back wiser and better next competition and hopefully bag a few cups next year.

Brendon in the Prizes again.

Brendon Caddy, our irrepressible soprano player has been busy again with a week of non stop success. Not content with his winnings at Gwent Youth Brass solo competition in June, he has been to the Indian Queens band solo contest where he won the under 15's slow melody, followed by first in the open slow melody. He came second in the open air varie and won best cornet overall. In addition to that, he succeeded in his audition for the National Youth Brass Band and Katrina Marzella has been giving him a ring to book an interview for the World of Brass Magazine. Our intrepid reporters will try to keep pace with all these developments and keep you informed as further details come to light. Sadly Brendon was not able to obtain a signed photo of himself with Katrina to display on the web site.
Brendon played Demelza in the 15y and under slow melody, Bilitis in the open slow melody and O'Lovely night in the open air varie.

Rachel to play with London Philharmonic

Rachel Crabb, who now plays Euphonium for us, having played Eb Bass for many years, has once more had her musical talents recognised. This time by the EMI Foundation. The EMI Music Foundation is an independent music education charity, established in 1997 to celebrate the centenary of EMI Records and to improve young peoples access to music education in the UK & Ireland. They have awarded her £1,500 giving her a total of £ 4,500 awarded towards her musical career this year. Patrons include Sir George Martin, Sir Paul McCartney,Yoko Ono, Sir Simon Rattle,Sir Cliff Richard,Diana Ross and Tina Turner.

In addition to this, Awards for Young Musicians who gave her the original £ 2,000 scholarship have nominated the 4 highest ranked award winners to spend the day with London Philharmonic Orchestra to take part in a day of creative ensemble music-making with their patron, Charles Hazlewood. The event will take place at Trinity College of Music on Sunday 29th November from 10.00 am to 5.00 pm.

http://www.charleshazlewood.com/album/index.html

On Sunday the 11th October, our Lead Percussionist John "sticks" Hodkin will be getting into training for next years summer season by running a half marathon at the Eden Project. This is all the more remarkable for his comeback from an episode in which his heart decided that it would beat a rhythm of its own, or rather not beat at all! John is collecting sponsorship for his efforts to go towards the Cornish Heart Unit, a charity supporting cardiac care in Cornwall. He has approached other Bandsmen with the promise of part of the proceeds to help St. Pinnock Band. There is no truth in the rumour that he is being sponsored by other Bands in the hope that a marathon will cause him to not be able to ensure a fantastic percussion section for Torquay next month.
Potential sponsors can contact John via the e-mail button on this site.

The end of the summer season is upon us, and as the Band rubs its sore feet after playing the Flora dance around various local villages. A quick look in the Trophy cupboard reveals............just a second place prize in a pasty baking competition, won by our Solo Cornet Norman Pendray!
Never mind, onward and upward as we head into the contest season with Torquay Looming in early November.

John proved that all donations to his chosen Heart charity, the Cornish Heart Unit are good value, as he successfully completed his half marathon run in 2hrs 10; despite heart surgery this year. Interviewed immediately after the run about how it went, our heroic runner is quoted as saying that #$$%^***()@~# but that £$£$%$£"!"£ and *&^&%^%^&*&, but that he enjoyed the downhill bits best.
The book is still open for people wishing to sponsor him for this sterling effort.

On the weekend weekend of the 7th, the Band set off for Torquay in high spirits ready to compete in the South West Brass Band Association's annual competition. An unusually shaky start kept us out of the prizes, and we had to be content with 4th place. However, Mount Charles youth aided by Brendon Caddy and Rachel Crabb, conducted by Jeremy Wilcock won the Junior competition with Rachel Crabb winning best Instrumentalist.

The Following Day, a good turn out of the Band, showing no ill effects of the previous day, performed at the Looe Remembrance parade in rather draughty atmospheric conditions. Ryan enjoyed it so much, that after taking notes from Norman, he did a repeat show at Dobwalls ; performing the Last post and Reveille himself at the memorial hall.

And finally, congratulations to Emma Jackson, Solo Horn on her television debut on ITV'S Doc Martin, playing the role of "on looking worried Brass Band player" when the teacher collapsed. Hollywood surely awaits!

The month finished with the AGM and the election of a shiny new committee. Dave the Chairman gave us a gentle greeting and kicked off the proceedings. The treasurer was able to show that the disasters of 2008 where bad weather had led to the cancellation of several gigs and consequent loss of income had been survived and the finances were now in a much better state. Jerry, our M.D., gave his views on what the band did well, what it did badly and where we could improve. All things considered, the band seems to be in a healthy state with some good new recruits and excellent attendence at events.

The run up to Christmas is as usual, a very hectic time for the Band, with the Sally Army Christmas Book working overtime. However on Saturday a select audience was treated to a musical cornucopia with a little (well quite a bit actually)help from the Torpoint Lady Singers. Under the title of "warming up for Christmas", the band played a variety of music. building up to a full blown Christmas finale. Rachel Crabb, who only moved to the Euphonium this year gave a wonderful rendition of Holy Night, the Cornet section gave us "Cornets Are Wild" and our all star multi-talented Trombone section with the last minute help of our old(but not in years!) friend Ann Wills, gave a rousing rendition of "Frolic for Trombones". The traditional Christmas after dinner snooze in front of the telly was left to Jurassic Park and Bach's Toccata gave it all a bit of classical quality. Chris Hansell was as always an excellent compere with his usual witty, pithy comments to keep the evening moving along, however many of the Ladies choir were disappointed that he was not wearing his Batman outfit with the black tights!

On a sad note, we learnt that the Bodmin Band Room had been burnt to the ground by two mindless junvenile idiots with the consequent loss of a vast library of irreplaceable Band music, instruments and kit. We have several players who have played with Bodmin in their time and would offer any help we can to Bodmin Band, and of course our sympathies and best wishes for the future.

It is with real mixed feelings that the Band learned that Mount Charles Band have officially offered Brendan Caddy a seat as their Soprano Player. This is our loss but their gain and it is certainly a huge step up for Brendan into the top flight of the banding world. We wish him well and look forward to his performance in the hot seat at the Yeovil competition in a couple of months. Brendan joined the Band in '06 in time for St. Pinnocks trip to the third section finals in Harrogate and has been a constant member ever since, and was undoubtably one of the most entertaining members of the Band. We will all watch his continuing climb in the Banding world with interest.

Looe Lantern Procession surpassed itself this year with a tremendous display of Lanterns and a very impressive larger than life Camel. The temperatures were a little on the Artic side, but we sought refuge in the Fish Market which had light and a lack of wind! Interesting aromas filled our lungs when playing but we all have to make sacrifices for the common good!

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. It took the hardiest of the Bands dedicated blowing team to brave the depths of a Cornish winter complete with snow, ice, freezing fog and general symptoms of non-beach weather to trek to the depths of Herodsfoot forest for what turned out to be the last gig of the year. This Jolly job has already become a popular favourite with the Band with a warm welcome from the management and free barbecue. The Holidaymakers were a little bemused as to why a dozen adults would travel into the woods, at night, at Christmas, in rather inclement weather to play a few carols. Its a great hobby!
Sadly the road conditions were such that our annual trip to Trefanny had to be abandoned as did our caroling around Taphouse.