Wonderfully Odd Waterford!

Last Sunday was a strange one for me.

It started early on Sunday morning, with me furiously trying to sew a rather old and tired Santa hat, on to the top of my helmet (cycling!). Now, I would never confess to be a dab hand at sewing and judging by the many, many Heath Robinson repairs to socks, cycling bibs, even an old Scotland patch on my winter tights. I would never make the televised stages of the BBC’s Sew Bee programme! Being the thrifty Scot I am, it is in my DNA to try and save something, prior to eventually having to toss it into the correctly coloured plastic receptacle.

Having somehow secured Santa’s hat, I then had to in some way attach a pair of Dame Edna Everage’s, Christmas themed, glasses to my actual cycling glasses. All manner of tools were arranged on the breakfast table – snippers, cable ties, scissors, rubber bands, string and so on. In the end I gave up. I simply laid Dame Edna’s glasses over my existing pair. This of course reduced my visibility by 50% causing excruciating neck pain, as I strained many a muscle, to twist my head to silly angles to simply see where I was going.

 

Next was a scarf of tinsel. Simple in design and yet visually stunning. Well, so I thought until it was pointed out to me that the sliver shiny stuff was getting tangled up in my back wheel and could, in all likelihood, toss me off the bike whilst traversing the Tramore Road.

The reason for all the dressing up was of course, you’ve guessed it, the annual Biscuit Club Santa Cycle – Waterford to Tramore and back to Waterford, via the Christmas Carousel in John Robert’s Square.

Every variety of Christmas onesie was on display on Saturday morning. There was many a Santa, a few Reindeers, some elves and of course lots of twinkly lights, flashing hats and enough tinsel to wrap several trees.

The Santa Run, sounding like an old WWII codename for a secret bombing mission, was great fun and light-hearted. It was also amazing to see so many motorists beeping their horns, waving and acknowledging our dressing up efforts. Maybe this is the way to answer that age old car versus cycling rivalry – sharing the road and being happy in our own space!

Onto the carousel, then breakfast, a wee raffle, a prize-giving, lots of laughs, then off home to shower and onto part two of my second last Sunday, before the Big Man dressed in red arrives.

Into The Book Centre to meet our three judges, Mary O’Neill, Phil Brennan and Hazel Farrell, for the annual Waterford Business Group’s Winter Wonderbands.

You may well have seen and heard, three wonderful bands playing across the City, in performance areas that included; outside The Book Centre, George’s Street and Cathedral Square. The three bands taking part this year were the De La Salle Scout Pipe Band, City of Waterford Brass and Brass Band New Ross.

To hear such wonderful music popping up around our City Centre, at this festive time of year, added so much to our visitors’ experience of Winter in Waterford City. I heard so many people saying that the bands were “brilliant”, “stunning” and “why don’t we have this in our town?” There were people taking photographs and videos to capture the moment in time. Waterford has come up with this concept and we need to drive on with this winning formula, to bring it to the next level.

There can be no doubt that we have a City, County and region that are blessed with talented musicians. The task of separating the three bands proved extremely difficult for the judges. In the end the 2016 winners were announced as the City of Waterford Brass. We do hope that the 2017 event will expand and attract between 6 and 9 bands to the City next year.

So, my second last shopping Sunday before Christmas started off on a road bike, wearing festive themed Lycra and ending with sweet music.

Only in Waterford, could such an odd combination work so well!

Band!

As I have said and written about, on too many occasions to mention, this City has a smorgasbord of talent that just needs the right mechanisms to be showcased. We really do have leaders in so many fields. But, unfortunately the flip side to this is that we don’t in truth actually seem to be able shout from the rafters, to tell the outer reaches of our region that this is the case.

I have been attending the Massed Bands Concert now for a numbers of years and this year my Mother, Pam, and her partner, Ally, made their way from Scotland, by land and sea, to stay in Dunmore East for the last three weeks. This trip coincided with the Massed Bands Concert and naturally I wished to bring them along to hear some of the very best that Waterford has to offer.

Now, my Mum is a very talented and special lady. She, in a past life was a secondary school teacher in, shall I politely say, one of the tougher areas of County Fife – Cowdenbeath! An old mining town in Scotland, that would perhaps best be known for their semi-professional football team’s nickname “The Blue Brazil”. Incidentally, neither the football, scenery or the weather has any similarities with Brazil!

The Blue Brazil

Whilst teaching not only did Mum find time to create, pen and direct a number school musicals. She was very heavily involved in local amateur dramatics, through Glenrothes Amateur Musical Association (GAMA), wrote and starred in many a “one-woman” show and in general has a capacity for spotting genuine talent and talented people. So, this showcase of Waterford musical talent would be right up her street and something that she and Ally would enjoy to the max.

We duly turned up at the venue on Friday 14^th October, cushions in hand to protect our delicate derrières, and having met some of the performers and volunteers, we settled down for a night of emotional highs and lows.

Oh boy, this concert once again delivered!!!!

The unique combination of the De La Salle Scout Pipe Band, City of Waterford Brass, Thomas Francis Meagher Fife and Drum Band, and the Barrack Street Concert Band, supported by the Waterford Sting Ensemble, made very sweet music. The task of bringing four very distinct musical sounds together cannot be underestimated. Both Julie Quinlan and Mark Fitzgerald waved their magical batons with astonishing affect. The combination of pipes, drums, brass, strings and the “big triangle” was an intoxicating mix.

During the pipe medley my own national anthem “Flower of Scotland” was played and three loan figures stood up, in front of an audience of hundreds, and we sang away to our hearts’ content. Though I did notice the odd strange look of “What are those three doing?” and I am sure that once it was explained that this was Scotland’s national anthem, we were Scottish through and through, then all was ok and we were not to be labelled loopy!

The evening once again delivered an exhilarating night of musical tunes, airs, marches and some wonderful singing by Valerie Leahy, Donna Roche and David Flynn.

If you missed this annual jamboree of the very best of Waterford talent, then you must put the date in your diary for 2017 and ensure that you tell the world.

I ask Mum and Ally what they thought of the evening. Not only were they both delighted to be asked to attend, by Ger O’Brien, they, like me and the hundreds of people who came along, felt the evening was magnificent.

A City of Music, we certainly are, and yet outside of our ancient walls, we seem to be lacking in that confidence to tell people that, at some things, we are amongst the very best in the region if not the nation. We have this fear of telling other people, which seems to be endemic and we must ALL work much harder to promote the many talented people we all know live here in Waterford.

Maybe the missing few who did not attend have a big part to play in this going forward?

P.S. Well done Mr Q - you know who you are!

The countdown is well and truly on!

A Countdown conundrum!

A little over one week to C-Day and joy of joys the City Centre, last weekend, had a steady flow of people alternating between the spine of the City, the Barronstrand Street, John Robert’s Square, Broad Street, Michael Street and Applemarket axis, and the Viking Triangle area, with a few popping up the hill to take in the winter offerings in and around Ballybricken.

I believe that the whole offering last Sunday was exceptional and after an unspeakable spell of very bad weather many people and many visitors took respite after storm Desmond, and committed to going out prior to the next storm Eva arriving, to come into the City Centre and sample Waterford at Christmas.

2015 is in fact my fifteenth Christmas in Waterford and over these last fifteen years I have witnessed the City grow in stature as a destination for Christmas shoppers. These much needed and very welcomed shoppers are the lifeblood of many of our businesses and the festive period is probably one of the few times of the year where a profit can actually be made.

Many of our businesses can be operating on margins as low as 5% and that means the tills need to ring at an ever faster pace in order to make enough margin to see businesses through the barren and lean months of January and February that follow the flurry of Christmas activity.

There was much on offer on Sunday 13^th December and one of the highlights had to be the Winter Wonderbands competition that saw the City of Waterford Brass lift the inaugural Waterford Business Group sponsored trophy.

Jubilant City of Waterford Brass.

The concept saw three of our City’s finest, the City of Waterford Brass, De La Salle Scouts Pipe Band and the Thomas Francis Meagher Fife and Drum Band, compete across three performance areas located in Broad Street, Applemarket and the Bishop’s Palace. The whole event was supported by WLR FM’s outside broadcast unit and a running update was given live on air throughout the afternoon.

At just after 3pm the winners were announced and after much whooping and hollering interviews with the judges and band members took place live on air. This event will return in 2016 with perhaps as many as ten competing bands and in 2017 the whole event has the potential to become a national event taking in both a Saturday and a Sunday.

Winter Wonderbands was part of a promoted “Shop Local Sunday” commitment and it gave those who ventured into the City Centre something a little bit extra special and it also gave three of our City bands the opportunity to showcase themselves to a whole new market audience.

The reaction to the competition was priceless. With mums, dads, kids, and grandparents all stopping to sing, tap their feet, dance and jump around with excitement as one after another our favourite Christmas tunes were energetically played by all the band members concerned. Whilst it is very difficult to solely judge three very different bands one of the criteria for judging was audience participation and all three bands made a monumental effort to get their audience involved.

Calvin's logic.

A very high bar has now been set as many visitors to the City thought that this type of activity was the norm for Waterford at Christmas. I have no doubt that many will have left Waterford last weekend wishing they lived here and after what was on offer who can blame them for thinking that way.

It often takes an “outsider’s eyes” to remind us just what we have to offer and so many visitors to Waterford see a wonderful compact medieval City that is both big enough and yet small enough to enjoy.

Our challenge will be to continue that offering far beyond C-Day and ensure our City grows and expends at a rapid pace. The solid foundations are there we just need to give a few people a gentile New Year kick in the ass to remind them what is needed.