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LOCAL TALENT

Meadow Lake New Horizons Band prepares for spring concert

Apr 9, 2026 | 12:31 PM

Meadow Lake’s New Horizons Band is getting set for one of their biggest concerts of the year.  

The band, which includes about 30 musicians ranging from young teenagers to retirees, has been working hard to bring their spring concert to life. 

“What’s neat about that is just watching all these people come together, help each other because it’s a community group,” said band director Benjamin Giesbrecht. “It’s very much a community-based thing where you see all these people from different backgrounds come together, work together, and make some big things happen.” 

He said this specific concert will be very special to Meadow Lake as the band performs alongside a special guest.  

“We have Arlene Shiplett coming up. She’s originally from North Battleford and she is the second horn with the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra, and she teaches at the University of Saskatchewan on horn. It is going to be a nice little thing for our community; we don’t get those high-level symphony players up here very often,” said the director. 

For Giesbrecht, having the opportunity to play alongside Shiplett is personally very exciting as she was his music teacher growing up.  

“It’s kind of the professional equivalent of if you move away from home and then your parents come for a visit. Our parent organization is also going to bring her into the schools, and she’s going to work with a lot of the students in the area as well,” he said. 

Entry for the spring concert is by donation to the band; this helps the group purchase more music and upgrade their equipment.  

“Some of our music equipment is good, but it’s also starting to get old enough that those replacements are starting to need to happen. We are looking to hopefully get a vibraphone as quick as we can because that’s something that neither the community group has access to or the high school doesn’t have one either, so we would share it,” said Giesbrecht.  

The band hopes to highlight what community music involvement can lead to.  

“We hear all the time about what being in music and being in an ensemble can do for students in school. But there’s only a few communities around the province that really have that same thing that continues into adult life,” the director explained.  

The New Horizons Band concert will take place on April 27 at the Carpenter High School Theatre.  

Alyssa.rudolph@pattisonmedia.com