Musical Director: Robert Baxter
Robert Baxter has conducted the band since 2000.
Since graduating as a trumpet player from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama (now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland), Robert has worked extensively with all of the professional orchestras in Scotland. Further afield he has performed with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Manchester Camerata, Singapore Symphony, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Tenerife Symphony Orchestra, and the New London Consort to mention a few. He studied conducting with Ilan Volkov and Kristian Kluttig.
Robert Baxter is a regular guest conductor for Scottish Ballet and has conducted The Nutcracker, Coppélia, The Scandal at Mayerling, Dextera, Cinderella, The Snow Queen and A Streetcar Named Desire at theatres throughout the UK. His debut with the RSNO was to conduct the British premiere of Gavin Bryars’ viola concerto with Morgan Goff at Glasgow’s Tramway and he has also conducted the premiere of the animated film Yoyo and the Little Auk with subsequent performances across Scotland. Robert has conducted the RSNO for various Netflix and other film sessions in the studio, and in early 2023, conducted a week of concerts entitled John Williams at the Oscars with sold out performances in Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow.
Robert has conducted the Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra and has been Musical Director for Colours Classical and for Belle and Sebastian at the OVO Hydro in Glasgow and for Goodgreef Classical in England. He conducted for Celtic Connections for a BBC TV broadcast from the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall with The Chieftains, Kris Kristofferson and Eddie Reader.
Robert has led hundreds of youth and community music projects and is currently the creative lead for the RSNO’s community orchestra, All Together Now. He has been course director for NYOS Spring Academy and conducted the Gadfly Project with Dance House. In 2021 he was delighted to receive the award from Making Music for the Best Instrumental Music Director in recognition for his pioneering work involving online music making during the pandemic.
Robert is founder and artistic director of DCB Kessington, the home of DCB, and is currently chair of the trustees of the Scottish Schools Orchestra Trust.
Associate Conductor: Michelle McCabe
Michelle McCabe was appointed Associate Conductor of Dunbartonshire Concert Band in 2015.
Michelle graduated from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland with BA (Hons) and a postgraduate degree in Orchestral Studies, winning the Governor’s Recital Prize for Chamber Music. She studied further at the Banff Centre for the Arts in Canada and then developed her workshop and creative music-making skills at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama. This led to performing regularly for Yehudi Menuhin’s Live Music Now! scheme, leading workshops for Artlink Central and performing with the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland.
As a freelance musician Michelle has performed with many orchestras and chamber ensembles including the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the Red Note Ensemble, the Auricle Ensemble and the Scottish Flute Trio. For the last 20 years she has played sub-principal flute with the Scottish Ballet Orchestra, and in the 2022/23 season played in all 72 performances of The Snow Queen tour.
Michelle is Musical Director of the Dunbartonshire Wind Ensemble and the High School of Glasgow Wind Band and Flute Ensembles. She also works with the DCB clarinet ensemble, creating programmes of music for local community concerts.
Michelle is the flute tutor for various groups including The National Youth Wind Ensemble of Scotland, West of Scotland Concert Band and Training Band, Strathclyde University Concert Band and The University of Scotland Symphony Orchestra.
The Committee (as of October 2022)
- Ruth Sinclair (chair)
- Fiona Ross (treasurer)
- Alison McCree (secretary)
- Heather Brown (vice chair)
- Susan Macfarlane (librarian)
- John Carswell
- Anne Dunbar
- Anna Baker
- Robert Baxter (MD ex officio)
The Band
Piccolo/Flute: Fiona Chisholm, Karen Clayton
Flute: David Brown, Angela Caldwell, Carrie Dixon, Anne Dunbar, Ann Fairfull, Joan Gemmell, Emily Hutchinson, Margaret Isaacs, Morven McCulloch, Louise Muir
Oboe: Ruth Hart, Alison McCree
Oboe/Cor Anglais: Alan Cooper
E Flat Clarinet: Laura Hunter
Clarinet: Zoe Booth, Moyra Hawthorn, Annie Lester, Susan Macfarlane, Fiona McLean, Monika Mihm Carmichael, Emma Mitchell, James Morgan, Michele Muir, Sula O’Duffy, Ruth Sinclair, Fraser Thomson, Jan Wallace
Alto Clarinet: David Broad
Bass Clarinet: Cameron McCulloch
Bassoon: John Carswell, Harriet Fishley, Lorraine Sherry, Jonathan Smithers
Soprano/Alto Saxophone: Jacqui McMahon
Alto Saxophone: Adam Jacobs, Sharon MacDonald, Paul Mulheran, Steven Peat, Kerry Shaw
Tenor Saxophone: Alison Beattie, Jane Ireland
Baritone Saxophone: Bob Kennedy
Horn: Anna Baker, Neil Harper, Steven Millar, Fiona Ross, Colin Suckling
Trumpet/Cornet: George Gourlay, Kirsty Harvie, Claire Hendry, Orlaith Macqueen, Andrew McCafferty, Megan Monkhouse, Charlotte Neilson, Stewart Watts, Emma Wylie
Trombone: Jack Clark, Anneli Demberg, Hazel Ferguson, Andrew MacDonald, Sarah Venning
Euphonium: Ian Brooke, Grant Henderson
Tuba: Andrew Kwan, Adam Wilson
Bass Guitar: Julian Fosh
Percussion: Heather Brown, Alan Hunter, David MacDonald, Grant McIntosh
Meet the Band – a growing collection of informal member profiles
Honorary Life Members: Arthur Main, David Welsh, Alan Cooper, David Broad
Founding Fathers…
Glyn Bragg, one of the founding fathers of DCB, was appointed our first Honorary President in 2016 in recognition of his long-term commitment and ongoing support of the band, serving until 2023. Glyn has had a distinguished musical career as a professional player, composer, arranger, conductor and BBC producer.
A native of Northumberland, Glyn Bragg’s early enthusiasms were singing in the local church choir and supporting Newcastle United Football Club. Moving to York in 1956 opened up new opportunities for musical development and taking up the trombone and percussion gained him admission to the National Youth Brass Band and National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.
Glyn began his professional career, whilst still at school, with the Northern Sinfonia Orchestra supplemented by working in a music shop, where learning about the world of publishing would prove to be invaluable. Before a music exhibition took him to King’s College, Cambridge, for four years, he enjoyed a summer season playing in the Whitby Spa Orchestra – sixteen weeks at £19 per week – nourishing his lifelong enthusiasm for so-called ‘light” music.
He joined the BBC Scottish Orchestra in Glasgow as Principal Timpanist at the end of 1967 after working as an extra with the BBC Symphony and Concert Orchestras, London Mozart Players and Bath Festival Orchestra. Exposure to concert halls and recording studios was again to become extremely useful when he was appointed Senior Music Producer at Queen Margaret Drive in 1979. He left in 1993 having planned around 750 broadcasts, particularly for his orchestra but also for piping. Three years earlier he had produced concerts by the Scottish National Orchestra and Vienna, Berlin and Israel Philharmonics as part of Glasgow’s stint as European City of Culture.
Music can be multi-faceted and there have been many opportunities to combine business with pleasure. As well as continuing to freelance with the Scottish Opera and Ballet companies, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the RSNO, he ‘fixed’ ad hoc orchestras for his own light music concerts and choral societies around Scotland. This provided welcome employment for local players and singers. Conducting was another outlet and he was equally at home in Glasgow Cathedral and Paisley Abbey with Mozart’s Requiem as he was in the theatre as musical director in Singin’ in the Rain. Teaching percussion, particularly at the RSAMD and in North Ayrshire schools, was especially rewarding. His academic background came to the fore when he was, for twenty years, a part-time tutor in the Senior Studies Institute at the University of Strathclyde.
Glyn’s major interest has long been in arranging music for many different combinations and he was a regular contributor to BBC TV’s Songs of Praise. However, the greatest pleasure has been in having the good fortune to be able to provide a few scores for DCB in the past half-century.
Geoffrey Haydock – text in preparation
Website
Design: Kerry Shaw
Website photos: Rob Cunningham, Elaine Ellen, Michael Andrew & band members
Technical wizardry: Alan Cooper, Ben Cooper
Making Music Rep: Neil Harper
DCB Trustees: Jill Bolling, Alan Cooper, Moyra Hawthorn, Jonathan Smithers, Colin Suckling,
