KOLBOTN-GARDEN
Kolbotn-Garden (the Kolbotn Guard Marching Show Band) is located at Kolbotn, in the county Oppegaard, which borders to Oslo in the south-east. The band consists of about 50 girls (15 recruits) at the age 7-18 years who play in the band as a hobby.
History
Kolbotn-Garden was founded by Bjørg Aukner on December 5th 1959 as a marching show band for girls and is this year celebrating its 50 year anniversary. From the start the band had only 20 members who were playing drums and cymbals. Their first performance was on the Norwegian national day, May 17th, in 1960. Back in 1959 you could find many marching bands, but these were for boys only. A band for girls was really unheard of! But Bjørg Aukner realized her dream and founded Kolbotn-Garden and the spirit that we still today describe as the “Garden-spirit”; that we are proud of our achievements and our slogan “unity makes us strong”.
In 1962 the first signal trumpets was included in the band and in 1965 the band made their first tattoo performance. The band has performed new tattoos every year since. Different instruments have found their way into and out of the band, and today you’ll find drums, marching drums, two-tone-drums, base drums, trumpets and marching trombones in the band. The number of girls in the band has for the last years varied between 40 and 50.
From 1965 the band has been conducted by the son of Bjørg Aukner, Dag Aukner, who’s also been the drillmaster as well as the conductor. And he’s still with us today. For 44 years he’s been composing new tattoos and arranged music especially for the band every year. For his work and achievements with Kolbotn-Garden, Dag Aukner was given “The Kings Medal of achievement” in 2004.
Golden moments
Since the band was founded in 1959 Kolbotn-Garden has been one of the most famous attractions of its kind in the southeastern part of Norway. The band has represented Kolbotn and Norway on many of its travels abroad and in Norway, and on several occasions with His Majesty the Kings Guard Band. In 2003 Kolbotn-Garden participated in the world championship for marching show bands in Monza, Italy, and achieved good results. The band has also won the Norwegian championship several times. One of the proudest moments in the history of Kolbotn-Garden was in May 2008 when the band was invited to participate in the Norwegian Military Tattoo Parade in Oslo as the only civilian band. Other participants were The Band of H M Royal Marine, HM the Kings Guard Band, HM the Kings Guards Silent Drill Team, The Royal Norwegian Navy Band, Gebirgsmusikkorps, Garmich Partenkirchen, Dutch Pipes & Drums, The Finnish Conscript Band, the Finnish Drill platoon, The Representative Military Band of the Romanian Ministry of Defence, and The Royal Swedish Navy Band. To see the girls in Kolbotn-Garden, 8-18 years old, formed up at Akershus fortress in Oslo between The Band of H M Royal Marine and The Representative Military Band of the Romanian Ministry of Defence was quite a sight, and gave the girls a memory that will be hard to forget. It was a great honor for the band to participate in such a grand event.
The school band tradition in Norway
The school band tradition in Norway goes back to 1901, and started out as an activity strictly for boys. School bands are marching bands that recruit children and youths from the school in the area where they live. In Norway almost every primary school has its own band. The age of the members normally varies between 7 to 19 years. The musical training is not a part of the school curriculum, but takes place in the evening on the children’s spare time, usually two days a week. In 2007 there were about 68 000 band members in Norway in about 1700 bands all over the country. Many of the professional musicians in Norway have started their career in a local school band, thus school bands are an essential part of the recruiting and musical education system in Norway.
Management
The management of the bands is like the management of a small business, based on voluntary work by the parents. A Board is elected every year to see to that the by-laws of the band are being followed. Professional musicians are employed or hired to do the musical training and/or the training is done at the local community music school. Except from a small yearly membership fee, most of the money to buy instruments, uniforms, musical training etc. is earned by voluntary work. In Kolbotn-Garden most of the income is made from the yearly flea market where all the parents have to participate in collecting, sorting and selling second hand goods. Other sources of income are the three cake lottery tickets every year, where parents are baking cakes and selling lotteries on stands throughout the community. The girls in the band are contributing by selling the Kolbotn-Garden calendar, matchboxes, and lottery tickets. It is always a challenge to find new ways of income for the band as expenses increase year by year because of taxes etc.
The 50 year anniversary
For the celebration of the 50 year anniversary of Kolbotn-Garden there will be several markings during 2009. The band is releasing a book with the history of Kolbotn-Garden, containing old and new pictures, stories told by former members, list of all the members that have played in the band since the start, names of all the parents that have been members of the board thorough the years etc. Kolbotn-Garden will also arrange a tattoo which will be held at the local stadium with HM the Kings Guard Band as the guest of honor. Marching show bands from Norway, Sweden and Denmark have been invited, in addition to local traditional school bands. As all tattoos should have a bag pipe band, the Oslo Caledonian Pipe Band has also been invited. After the tattoo the band is leaving for Malta on June 25th, where it will take part in local festivals and parades during the following week. Kolbotn-Garden has visited Malta on an earlier occasion, and some of the locals might remember and recognize the band. We really hope to see you there!
(written by Kristin Samuelsen)
Kolbotn-Garden , Postboks 120, 1411 Kolbotn.
