He was made a life member of the Hastings Citizens Band in 1992, of the BBANZ in 2008, and of Deco Bay Brass in 2018, in a career which included being on the committee that brought the national brass band championships to Napier in 2009, and chaired the committee when they were in the Bay again in 2018.
It all started when he was at Heretaunga Intermediate and responded to the call for new, and young, members of the Citizens Band, and he notes the call is still out for new, and young, members.
He had asthma as a child, and believes, backed by some researched evidence, that its resolution came from his active part playing the instruments in the band, of which he describes himself as “just another member”.
There was still life for other interests outside family, career and the bands, and he served on school committees, the board of Napier’s Sacred Heart College, where wife Shona was the receptionist, as a street co-ordinator for Neighbourhood Watch - since its inception - as a manager of election day polling booths, and a tutor of engaged couples marriage preparation courses.
He said he’s “very humbled” to be adjudged as worthy of the MNZM, for what has been a life of opportunities that he says he would not have had, had he not embarked on the bands pathway in 1961.
