A brass band festival and a spectacular Brass Band Proms will be adding a Yorkshire flavour to the city’s summer of celebrations for York 800 and the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.
Eight York brass bands will showcasing their talent in a weekend of open-air concerts in York’s Museum Gardens on 30 June and 1 July, while on 20 August York’s top two bands join forces for a rip-roaring Proms concert on the stage of the Mystery Plays Theatre in the Museum Gardens.
Both events are being put on by Brassed On York Ltd with the support and backing of City of York Council to mark York 800.
The brass band festival follows on from the original Brassed On York 2010 festival, which drew audiences of several hundred to the massed bands performance of music from the popular film Brassed Off. This year the bands will play different music, but the links with fictional Grimley Colliery Band continue: just as the film, two of York’s bands – Shepherd Group Brass Band and the York Railway Institute Brass Band – have qualified for the National Brass Band Championships of Great Britain!
York audiences will be able to appreciate the bands’ quality musicianship themselves when the two bands come together to play as one on the massive Mystery Plays stage for the special ‘Proms in the Gardens’ on Monday 20 August. The outdoor theatre, which seats over 1400, is a temporary structure for the York Mystery Plays 2012 and the audience will be under cover (though the performers will not).
The Proms concert, in aid of the Lord Mayor of York’s charities, is a one-off event and will feature the 1812 Overture and all the Last Night of the Proms favourites, as well as specially arranged and commissioned music to celebrate York’s 800 years of history. Tickets cost from £12 to £20 and can be booked through the Theatre Royal box office.
Before that, over the weekend of Saturday 30 June and Sunday 1 July, both bands will be giving their own concerts in York’s Museum Gardens as part of Brassed On York 2012. The unseated performances will take place on the main lawn below the Yorkshire Museum and both days are free.
The Shepherd bands – which also include the Beginners Band, Youth Band and Concert Band – will perform on Saturday morning (10.00am-1.00pm) and the York Railway Institute bands – which include the York RI Golden Rail Band and Golden Rail’s Development Band as well as York RI – will be playing on Sunday afternoon, from 12 noon to 5pm, along with Acomb-based Ebor Brass.
Both day’s showcases will conclude with a rousing massed bands finale, with up to 100 brass musicians and percussionists all playing together, performing a specially written piece of music by Paul Lovatt-Cooper entitled ‘Going The Distance’, as well as brass-band classics. The bands are all participating in the ‘Brass the Baton’ marathon, part of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad, a relay race involving five different coloured conductor’s batons that being passed around the UK, organised by the British Federation of Brass Bands.
‘Both events are going to be a truly awesome spectacle and sound,’ said Festival Director Kate Lock. ‘We are very grateful to City of York Council for their support for this year’s Brassed On York Festival and we are delighted to get sponsorship from the Co-op for Proms in the Garden. I think people will love coming to see an accessible and affordable Proms right in the heart of York and it’s an unique part of the York 800 celebrations.’
Tickets for Proms in the Gardens cost £20, £17.50 and £12 (concessions from £15). Booking through Theatre Royal box office: 01904 623568 or online at www.yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
Brassed On York 2012: www.brassedon.org or find us on Facebook at Brassed On! York
Further information: 07792 633984 or email Kate@klockworks.co.uk