The Ventura County Concert Band is a community band in Ventura. The band was founded in 1964 and operates as a community service under the auspices of the Ventura Adult and Continuing Education Office. The band’s members are volunteer musicians from widespread personal and professional backgrounds.
Larry Weiss served as the band’s musical director and conductor from 1974 to 2008. For thirty-four years, Larry instilled a high standard of musical excellence and audience interaction; all for the pure love of music. It is from that perspective that the VCCB continues on after Larry’s passing sustaining his legacy of high caliber community musical concerts.
This year, under the musical direction of Dr. Julie Judd, the band celebrates its 59th Anniversary Season. Dr. Judd obtained her Masters in Music Degree in Wind Conducting from the University of South Florida and her Doctorate Degree from Pepperdine in 2015. Dr. Judd serves as the Chief Technology Officer for the Ventura County Office of Education.
Over the past fifty-nine years a lot of great music has been performed including traditional band repertoire, light classics, music from modern concert compositions, marches, standard “pops” selections, popular tunes of the day and big band selections.
The real story behind the VCCB is its dedicated membership. Many of the volunteer members have been with the Band for over thirty years. Howard Leach, playing clarinet, is a local architect with offices in Ventura and a founding member having played with the Band for 59 years.
Its members are truly dedicated to the Band’s mission of playing music at a very high standard for the benefit of the community at large free of charge. The Band rehearses weekly and performs four times during the Ventura Unified School District academic year.
As the VCCB looks forward to its 60th anniversary season, they do so at a time when sadly, in a difficult economic climate, music and art programs often are cancelled barely surviving. We believe that our story will be inspiring to other people involved with community service organizations, especially those in the performing arts.
The Band will next perform on Sunday, June 4th, at 3:00 at the Ventura High School auditorium. The June concert will be a “Pops” concert including music from Disney, Rodgers and Hammerstein, The Beatles, Henry Mancini, Stevie Wonder, Stephen Sondheim, Louis Armstrong, and George and Ira Gershwin.
