Campbell River Community Band has a new conductor, Bruce Dunn, and he is taking over the reins in time for this Sunday’s (April 14) concert at the Campbell River Baptist Church.
Dunn is retiring to his home ground after twenty seven years as resident music director of Kamloops Symphony Orchestra, a collection of fifty professional musicians. Closer to home he was instrumental in getting the Comox Valley Youth Music School off the ground.
“It feels really good to be back in my long-ago-home area,” Dunn says. “And better still to be able to carry on using my music skills.”
As well as being a conductor, Bruce also plays the French horn and has played with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and for the National Ballet.
Celine Ouellette, the group’s previous conductor, says she is pleased to get back to playing first horn with the band.
“It is my hope to see some growth in the Community Band and for us to make a real contribution to the artistic richness of our community,” Dunn says. “If you play a band instrument, please talk to me after our concert. We would love clarinets, oboes, flutes, a bassoon as well as brass and percussion.”
The concert will be in the Campbell River Baptist Church on South Dogwood Street on April 14 at 2 p.m. The program contains the popular Folk Song Suite and Linden Lea. Also included will be Campbell River Sketches, by a Washington State composer who visited the area, and Thompson River Sketches, written by Dunn in 2006 and refers to the area around Kamloops where he lived until two years ago when he moved to Campbell River.
Admission is by donation.