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Hat-trick for Whitburn at West Lothian Challenge 

Whitburn Band has won the West Lothian Challenge Contest for the third year in a row after the final at the Howden Park Center in Livingston.

Competing against Newtongrange Band, Whitburn continued their excellent recent form by winning the contest under the direction of Professional Conductor Andrew Duncan.  The band’s Principal Cornet player Eleanor Ferguson also picked up the prize for the Best Soloist in the contest with her exceptional performance of Ralf Lovland’s ‘You Raise Me Up’ arranged by Andrew Duncan.

The band played a varied programme of music in the final for adjudicators Philip Sparke and Tony Swainson.  They started with the ‘Phantom Menace’ from Andrew Duncan’s arrangement of the film score from ‘Star Wars’.  The band then played ‘The Old Shepherdess and the Norse Maiden Spirit’ from ‘A Hebridean Suite’.  The band continued by playing the overture from the film ‘Tarus Bulba’.

Eleanor Ferguson was the band’s first featured soloist in ‘You Raise Me Up’ before Whitburn gave an energetic performance of the ‘Scherzo’ from Shostakovich’s 10^th Symphony.  Evelyn Bradley was the excellent soloist in Philip Sparke’s ‘Pantomime’ before the audience was treated to ‘The Bass Boys’ complete with beach balls and a special guest from the hit film ‘Jaws’!

The band’s second ensemble item was the beautiful ‘Scarlet Ribbons’ which featured the solo talents of Jim Chamberlain, Evelyn Bradley, Mark Boyd, Ian Fleming and Anne Crookston on Piano.  Whitburn concluded their programme with the excellent ‘Manchester Tale’, which once again was from the pen of the band’s talented composer and conductor Andrew Duncan.