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Navy Band Provides Opportunity

By Leading Seaman Cathy Wainwright

Work experience within the Royal Australian Navy Band provides an opportunity to generate an interest in a career as a Naval Musician, as well as offering a means for the Band Branch to contribute to the development and education of Australian students.
Defence supports the provision of work experience for secondary and tertiary level students at Defence establishments. Such placements foster community awareness of the ADF and Navy in general, and the role and activities of the RAN Band in particular. As such these placements represent another important public relations activity through which we can ‘strengthen relationships across and beyond Navy’.

2011 has seen an unprecedented demand for Work Experience placements within the Sydney Detachment (11 to date), and opportunities in the Melbourne Detachment are now also included on the Department of Defence Work Experience website.

Country students are just as keen as city students to experience life in the RAN Band, and recently I caught up with 16 year old Georgia Creighton at the Sydney Band Studio. Georgia is a Year 11 student from Cobram, a small pastoral, dairy, fruit and wine growing town on the Victorian side of the Murray River between Albury and Echuca. Georgia’s parents had taken a break from growing tomatoes and grain crops on their farm to holiday in Sydney for a week whilst Georgia completed her Work Experience placement. For Georgia it was also an opportunity to see if she would really like to swap farm life for the big smoke or the ocean blue.

Georgia is considering two options in the Navy after she leaves school. Her first preference is to apply for Seaman Officer Entry as she is keen to learn ship’s navigation. (“It’s not all like Sea Patrol”, I felt obliged to inform her!) Her second interest is in becoming a Naval Musician – she is only frustrated that she cannot do both!

I found Georgia to be well informed about job opportunities in the Australian Defence Force. She had already attended a Defence Careers Information Day, researched job opportunities on the Defence jobs website and visited the Navy Band website.

Georgia said that she found the Band environment and activities to pretty much what she had expected. She admitted to excitement rather than nerves the night before her first day, and said the only thing she found surprising was that the Band was more ‘laid back’ than she was expecting. She quickly added that she could see, however, that they are not laid back when they are performing!

Georgia has been playing alto saxophone for two years having started on trombone in the school band program in Year 7. She plays in a concert band and big band at school, has private lessons organized through school and is also studying music theory. Georgia was very excited to be able to play with the Band for the recording of Lieutenant Stokes’ new fanfare Serving Australia With Pride.

During her week with the Band Georgia also had the opportunity to accompany the Band on a visit to St Patrick’s School, Sutherland, and the Admiral’s Own Jazz Group to a lunchtime performance in the beachside suburb of Manly. Georgia also had a glimpse of Naval ceremony witnessing the Chief of Defence Force’s Farewell Parade at Fleet Base East.

Georgia expressed surprised that during her week with the Band there were more performances and less rehearsals than she had expected. I explained to her that in the Navy Band no two days are the same, and certainly no two weeks are the same, so it is pretty much the luck of the draw for a one week Work Experience placement.

Who knows where Georgia will end up? She may even decide not to join the Navy at all as other opportunities present themselves in the next few years. One thing is certain, however, Georgia is one more person who will spread the word about the great opportunities the Navy and the Navy Band have to offer to young Australians.

Images

Georgia Creighton at the Sydney Detachment Studio