McCann joins Geneva Group
The Geneva Group has welcomed Dr Phillip McCann to the company as Development Consultant and Performance Artist. Phillip needs no introduction to brass band aficionados as a former Principal Cornet for Black Dyke Mills Band for a decade and a half. Famous for his distinctive sound, he is widely perceived as one of the most successful cornet players in the history of the brass band movement.
Phillip was born in Bo’ness, Scotland, and became regarded as ‘The cornet player’ with a sound everyone tried to emulate. As well as playing in one of the most successful bands in contesting history as principal cornet of Black Dyke, he is equally well known for his acclaimed series of Chandos CD recordings, ‘The World’s Most Beautiful Melodies’, universally admired for the exquisite tone and musical expression in the playing; recordings featured regularly on BBC Radio and Classic FM. Phillip’s unique style and tone quality has been used by composers with orchestra for film and television soundtracks, pre-eminently the hugely popular theme and incidental music for BBC TV’s, series ‘Hetty Wainthropp investigates’.
More latterly, McCann’s career has flourished with conducting and teaching. Many of Phillip’s students now occupy significant positions within the musical community as performers, conductors, composers and arrangers. Phillip is the recent recipient of an Honorary Doctorate of the University of Huddersfield, conferred upon him in recognition of his services to music and education. He now acts as a consultant for bands throughout Britain as well as internationally. Phillip is also the recipient of both the highly prestigious awards from the Worshipful Company of Musicians, the Mortimer Medal and the Iles Medal.
General Manager Brett Baker commented "It has been an absolute pleasure working with Phillip these past few months on a project to be fully announced in the near future. He is not just a fantastic player and fine musician, but also extremely knowledgeable when it comes to instrument development; this is extremely exciting both for the company and myself. Phillip’s renowned uncompromising pursuit of excellence and model consistency gets to the heart of what brass playing is all about.... the sound. I know players around the world will be interested in hearing about Phillip’s terrific developmental work and how this will align with the Geneva Group".
Phillip McCann stated, “I am proud to be involved with the Geneva Group and would like to thank sincerely Tim Oldroyd and everyone for allowing me the opportunity to fulfil my creative passion, which has, in its turn, allowed me in some ways to offer the best choice possible to cornet players in our movement .
“Geneva has kindly invited me to collaborate and contribute my expertise and experience towards development to face this new greatly exciting challenge. I truly want for people to love their instruments, in particular their cornets, but above all, I sincerely desire with a passion to be party to providing the greatest choice for our instrumentalists within the brass band movement.
“The single most important aspect of playing any instrument is sound! This has always been my philosophy in playing and teaching. We all need the instrument that will allow us to project our personality through the sound we create between us. This is the goal for both Geneva and myself. So, watch this space for exciting news in the very near future!”
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