Local band will share the stage with musicians from sister city
Group from Veendam here April 29 as part of 6-city tour of Alberta and B.C.
The Kelowna City Band will present a rare performance this spring in the Kelowna Community Theatre.
Although the band was formed in 1894, and so pre-dates the City of Kelowna by 19 years, it hasn’t often performed in the city’s biggest indoor theatre.
“It might have happened way back in the past, but I can’t think of a time when the band presented a concert in the theatre,” said longtime conductor Dennis Colpitts.
The special occasion for the April 29 show in the Community Theatre is a joint performance with the Winkler Prins Harmonie, a band from Veendam, Kelowna’s sister city in the Netherlands.
The Harmonie, made up of high school students and adults from the Dutch town, will be on a six-city tour of B.C. and Alberta. The group, which is marking its 40th anniversary in 2017, will also perform in cities such as Surrey, Banff, Maple Ridge and Kamloops.
For its part, the Kelowna City Band has 60 members, from young teenagers to people in their 80s. The group usually performs for free at events such as Canada Day and Remembrance Day, but has recently attracted sold-out, ticketed crowds at the 326-seat Mary Irwin Theatre in the Rotary Centre for the Arts.
The Kelowna Community Theatre has 853 seats.
“I’d love to see it filled for this special performance that celebrates the bond between our city and Veendam,” Colpitts said.
Kelowna and Veendam’s sistercity link dates back to the end of the Second World War when members of the Okanagan’s military regiment, the B.C. Dragoons, helped re-establish civilian authority in the Dutch town.
About 900 men served with the Dragoons, then a tank regiment, during the Second World War. During combat in Europe, 99 of the men were killed and 213 were injured.
About 200,000 Dutch were killed in the war, including 107,000 Jews — which represented three-quarters of the country’s pre-war Jewish population.
An emotional highlight of the April 29 joint concert at the Community Theatre is sure to be a performance of Hymn to Loved Ones Lost.