Palmerston North Boys' High School Big Band and musical director Neville Lauridsen are looking forward to the Manawatū Jazz & Blues Festival 2023.
Palmerston North Boys' High School Big Band and musical director Neville Lauridsen are looking forward to the Manawatū Jazz & Blues Festival 2023.
Neville Lauridsen tells his band there is no reason they have to sound like a school band.
Why not fly to the moon?
Palmerston North Boys’ High School Big Band is once again competing in the High School Jazz Competition. Held on June 3, it is part of the Manawatū Jazz & Blues Festival 2023. The festival opens on Friday with a swing dance with the Manawatū Jazz Club Big Swing Band and ends on June 5 with Cafe Scene.
It’s Lauridsen’s 17th year of taking the Boys’ High band and while it is a competition, he says it is also an opportunity to meet other musical directors and young musicians.
The competition is for big bands - up to 22 players with more ensemble work, and combos - four, five or six players with more solos.
It is a highlight of the year and when Lauridsen runs auditions in February he tells the students they need to be available at King’s Birthday weekend.
“Any performance I find is worth about three rehearsals.”
The musicians are put on the spot and really knuckle down and learn a lot.
The band came second in the inaugural Young Jazz Band-it Competition last year. Burnside High School from Christchurch won.
Lauridsen is an itinerant brass tutor and also takes the Feilding High School jazz combo.
“You’re only as good as your last gig and if you don’t do a good job that is what people will remember so you have to keep pushing all the time.”
Chrissy Toms and Neville Lauridsen are ready for the Manawatū Jazz & Blues Festival 2023 that starts on Friday. Photo / Judith Lacy
The Jazz & Blues Festival is organised by the Manawatū Jazz Club. Membership secretary Chrissy Toms is keen for the club she joined in 1972 to grow.
Toms loves the sound of jazz and the people - musicians are good people. You’ve always got something in common when you go to a festival or gig, she says.
Her husband Russell Toms’ last weekend on this planet was at the Manawatū Jazz & Blues Festival six years ago with Toms wheeling him around to gigs.
Lauridsen remembers from a young age going to listen to big bands.
“Holey moley, that’s my sound, that’s an awesome sound.”
He thought it would be good to play in a big band one day and then ended up taking them.
He is also the musical director for Swamp City Big Band, which is taking part in the Big Band Bash on June 4.
Michael Crawford and Hayden Lauridsen of Dirt Box Charlie fame are also in Swamp City as is another of Lauridsen’s sons, Brandon.
Swamp City is an opportunity for musicians who have left school to keep playing.
It is easy to put your instrument away and 10 years have gone by. Lauridsen always tells people to never sell their instrument unless they are getting a better one.
The High School Jazz Competition on Saturday, June 3, at the Globe Theatre starts at 10am and ends with the prizegiving at 3.45pm. Free entry.
Five big bands and 18 combos from 12 schools from Rotorua to Wellington are competing. As well as Boys’ High, the Manawatū flag will be waved by Palmerston North Girls’ High School, Freyberg High School and Feilding High School.
