The Lynchburg Pops was created on November 26, 2019 when Steve Aiello met with James Meredith to discuss forming a community band.  Jim agreed to become the band’s founding conductor and Steve agreed to become business manager/president.  A Facebook page was launched the next day and 24 people joined by the evening.  We now have a Facebook following of over 400 (as of May 2022) interested in the phenomenon of our founding and growth.  The business groundwork was laid over the next three months and the word spread about Lynchburg’s first community band rehearsal on March 7, 2020.  We had 50 come to the first rehearsal at Heritage High School and 60 the second week and we were expecting 70 for the third rehearsal and were overwhelmed at the excited response and the quality of the musicians who had come out to play under our very fine and well known conductor.  And then COVID…

Two years later, we have emerged from hibernation with over 60 members, 14 of which are professional instrument/band teachers from the elementary, middle, high school and university level.  Even with such a high level of professionalism in our ranks, the band’s mission is to serve the amateur band enthusiast who has not had an outlet for their passion for many, many years since leaving school and performing quality band music for our community and the promotion of band music in our schools  Our members range in age from upper teens to seniors in their ’80’s and every age in between.

We are fully incorporated with the Commonwealth of Virginia as a 501c3 Tax-Exempt performing organization. We are always looking for people and businesses to partner with us.  This can be done as an advertiser in one of our programs or as a sustaining member. All contributions as a sustaining member are organization are fully tax deductible.  You will find the form for this on our website.