Hathern Band raise thousands for LOROS

THERE was a capacity audience for Hathern Band’s first concert of the year held in aid of LOROS, the Leicestershire and Rutland hospice.

Conductor David Newman and the band treated the audience to a varied programme including several well known numbers from much loved films and musicals. Firstly, three songs from Les Miserables including ‘Bring Him Home’ featuring the beautiful playing of Mike Wood on flugel horn.

There was also a selection from the recent and very popular film, ‘Greatest Showman’ plus ‘Let it Go’ from Frozen and ‘Don’t Cry for Me Argentina’ from Evita. However, no brass band concert would be complete without a march and the Band’s first one was a great performance of the military march, ‘Colonel Bogey’. Later, they upped the tempo with the circus march, ‘Rainbow Pier’.

The concert also featured the solo talents of Adrian Drewitt on baritone who gave a beautiful rendition of ‘On my Own’ from Les Miserables. The second solo spot was taken by principal trombonist, Alex Bland. His soulful and mellifluous performance of the Hoagy Carmichael tune, ‘Stardust’ was a real treat.

LOROS is a charity close to the band’s heart as three members of the Hathern organisation received care from the Hospice. David Newman thanked the audience for their continued support of this concert, now in its 20th year. He also thanked Barclays Bank for their on-going commitment through their match-funding scheme, and announced that this year’s concert had raised the fantastic amount of £2,566.59, including £750 from Barclays Bank and £150 from two other donors.

This brings the total raised since the first concert to over £42,000, a wonderful amount for a fantastic charity.

The cheque was accepted by Adrian Walker, part of the fund-raising team at LOROS, who thanked everyone for raising over £2,500, and for a wonderful evening’s entertainment. Adrian went on to say that the Hospice is continuing to expand its services and now provides monthly clinics throughout the county and around 20-30 people per day use the new Day Therapy Centre. LOROS is also very proud that 90 pence of every pound raised goes towards patient care.

Before the final number, David Newman thanked all those involved with staging the concert but particularly band secretary Lesley Bentley and Hathern Church for the free use of their wonderful building.

A splendid rendition of the ‘Radetzky March’ had the audience clapping along in time to the music and provided a sparkling finale to a great evening’s entertainment.