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Community Band concert Thursday

The Williams Lake Community Band is pleased to present a Summer Concert this Thursday, June 25 from 7 to 8:30 p.m.
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The Williams Lake Community Band will give a concert in Boitanio Park Thursday evening

The Williams Lake Community Band is pleased to present a Summer Concert this Thursday, June 25 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. at the the Gwen Pharis Ringwood Stage in Boitanio Park.

The community band members are proud winners of a gold medal at the 2015 Cariboo Festival earlier this spring.

The band hopes to have 20 members on stage for Thursday’s concert.

“We like playing outdoors and have been practising outdoors during the month of June,” says Margaret Waring, who plays flute with the band.

Thursday evening she says the band will play a variety of pieces including two marches that they will be playing for the Daybreak Rotary Stampede Parade on Saturday and two gold winning pieces, Second Suite (in four parts) by Gustav Holst, and Denbridge Way by James Swearingen, which the group played for the Cariboo Music Festival.

They will also be playing a Blues Brother’s arrangement that they enjoy playing, Waring says. They will also play the first movement March and the fourth movement Fantasia on the Dargason.

“We might try a piece from the musical Phantom of the Opera and do a few Canadian themed numbers such as Farewell to Nova Scotia which we will also play on July 1 for Canada Day (in Boitanio Park),” Waring says.

The Williams Lake Community Band was formed in 1980 by a group of local musicians and meets Thursdays from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. in the Lake City Secondary Williams Lake Campus band room.

The band invites anyone interested in playing, such as those who have previously played instruments in high school bands, to join them, says band member Barb Doedel.

“We currently have about 25 members, some of whom are original founding members,” Doedel says. “We welcome the younger generation as well. For the past two years three students, all sisters have joined us.  Their participation in the band counts as credit towards their distance education programs.”

The band plays at many activities throughout the community including the Daybeak Rotary Stampede Parade this weekend, Canada Day next week, Remembrance Day Ceremonies, Festival of Lights/Santa Claus Parade and Christmas concerts, which are sometimes paired with LCSS bands.

“This weekend will be our 28th year playing in the Williams Lake Daybreak Rotary Stampede Parade,” Doedel says.