Saturday 29 June 2013 sees the Brassed On York brass-band showcase move from the Museum Gardens, where it was previously held, to York’s bustling Parliament Street, a location popular with brass bands – and their audiences – throughout the summer months.

There will be two performance areas within the main ‘activity area’  to accommodate the bands and allow smooth changeovers. Shepherd Group bands will play from the end nearest to Piccadilly; York RI bands will play outside M&S. Performances will alternate between the two areas with breaks of 10-15 minutes between each band. Only one band will perform at any one time.

The first band commences at 10.00am and the final band is expected to finish by 4.15pm. The programme is as follows:

10.00am Shepherd Group Beginners Band

10.35am York RI Golden Rail Development Band

11.15am Shepherd Group Youth Band

12.05pm York RI Golden Rail Band

1.00pm Shepherd Group Concert Brass Band

2.00pm York Railway Institute Band

3.15pm Shepherd Group Brass Band

Please note that in the event of inclement weather the brass-band showcase may be cancelled.

A full-colour brassed on 2013 flyer to promote the Brassed On York 2013 Festival is now available to view by clicking on the link .

The organisers wish to thank Ian Witchell of Yorkshire Print Services for his generous support for the Brassed On Festival by printing our flyers free of charge and providing free delivery of them.

Thank you, Ian!

27 June – Youngbrass, NCEM, Walmgate, York, 7.30pm

28 June – Swingbrass, Clements Hall, Nunthorpe Road, York, 8.00pm

29 June – Brassed On York, Parliament Street, York, 9.45am-4.15pm

Eighty young musicians from Norway and York will open this year’s Brassed On York Festival in a joint concert showcasing the wealth of youthful talent emerging from brass bands. 

Youngbrass, the title of the concert at the National Centre For Early Music in Walmgate, York, takes place on Thursday 27 June at 7.30pm and features a performances by a leading Norwegian youth brass band from Hasle Skole Musikkorps in Oslo and York’s own Shepherd Group Youth Band, based at Portakabin in Huntington. Each band will perform their own programme of music as well as coming together to play some joint items.

Ungdomsbrassen (pictured left), a band of 42 youngsters aged between 12 and 19, is the product of a brass-band musical education programme at Hasle Primary School in eastern Oslo under the guidance of Music Director Sissel Larsen. Children begin learning brass and percussion instruments from the age of seven or eight and progress through a system of bands, with the Youth Band (Ungdomsbrassen) being the highest level. Many of the students continue playing in the band when they go on to secondary and further education and the band has recently contested in the premiere league in the Norwegian Championships for school brass bands.

Shepherd Group’s Youth Band (below) is conducted by Craig Brown and grew out of the popular and well-attended Shepherd Group Beginners Band, which teaches children (and adults) to play brass instruments. The Beginners Band became so successful that the Youth Band was formed to progress the keen young players. It is York’s only dedicated Youth Brass Band and has quickly established a reputation for playing entertaining and high quality music.

The Brassed On Festival 2013 continues on Friday 28 June at 8.00pm with ‘Swingbrass’, a laid-back, cabaret-style evening of Big-Band music and jazz at Clements Hall in Nunthorpe Road, York, featuring the York Big Band Initiative  under the baton of well-known York musician Ian Chalk (trumpet player in York party band Huge and a regular on the York jazz scene). The York Big Band Initiative is run by York Music Service and is a modern, adult Big Band for developing musicians and has a strong brass line up of trumpets, trombones and saxophones, further extending the ‘brass’ theme of our festival. The evening winds up with a spot of late-night ‘free jazz’ by trumpet player Phil Hanson and his band H2.

The main event and highlight of the Brassed On York festival is the brass-band showcase, taking place this year in York’s Parliament Street on Saturday 29 June. All eight of York’s brass bands, from beginners up to Championship level, will perform individual concerts, with the programme commencing at 9.45am and continuing until 4.15pm. Bands taking part are Shepherd Group Beginners Band, Shepherd Group Youth Band, Shepherd Group Concert Brass Band, Shepherd Group Brass Band, York RI Golden Rail Development Band, York RI Golden Rail Band, York Railway Institute Band and Ebor Brass.

Tubarama, the Tuba World Record Challenge, which was originally due to take place on Sunday 30 June at York Racecourse, has now been postponed until 2014 at the earliest.

Brassed On York Ltd, a small, not-for-profit company, is the promoter of the festival. The company is delighted to announce that it has again secured sponsorship from the North Yorkshire Committee of The Co-operative Membership, which supported the original Brassed On York festival in 2010 in the Museum Gardens and last year’s York 800 Proms in the Gardens, a highly successful concert in the Mystery Plays Theatre performed by Shepherd Group Brass Band and York Railway Institute Band, which raised £4000 for the Lord Mayor of York’s charities.

The festival is also being supported by Co-operative Funeralcare.

‘We are very grateful to the Co-operative Membership for their continued support for our festival, which has a fundamentally co-operative theme at its heart – both locally, on the Saturday, and now internationally, too!’ said Brassed On York director Kate Lock.

Tickets for Youngbrass cost £5 for adults and  £2.50 for children and will be on sale on the door at the NCEM. To reserve tickets, email craigbrownbrass@gmail.com

Tickets for Swingbrass cost £5 and are available from Alison@yorkmusicservice.co.uk as well as on the door at Clements Hall.

For more information, go to www.brassedon.org or telephone 07792 633984

Notes for Editors 

1. Brassed On York began in May 2010 as a three-day festival, including a massed bands performance of the music from the film Brassed Off in York’s Museum Gardens and free workshops for children by members of the Grimethorpe Colliery Band (which played the fictional Grimley Colliery Band in Brassed Off). You can view a film of the festival highlights here. Brassed On York also produced a promotional film for the 2010 festival, available to view here.

2. Brassed On York Ltd is run by Kate Lock, Bruce Jackson and Terry Suthers, all members of the York RI Golden Rail Band. The company was set up to raise the profile of brass bands and encourage participation and recruitment into them, particularly by young people.

3. More about Hasle Skole Musikkorps here and a YouTube film of Hasle Skole Musikkorps contesting here  (play starts 4 mins in)

Shepherd Group Youth Band: contact Craig Brown, MD

York Big Band Initiative: contact Ian Chalk, MD

Shepherd Group Brass Bands

York Railway Institute Band

York RI Golden Rail Band (and Development Band)

Ebor Brass

Brassed On York Ltd is delighted to announce that it has secured funding from the North Yorkshire committee of The Co-operative Membership for the Brassed On York 2013 Festival (27-29 June).

This is the third time that the Co-operative Membership has given generous sponsorship to the York music festival: the committee supported the original Brassed On York 2010 Festival and also sponsored the highly successful York 800 Proms in the Gardens concert organised by Brassed On York Ltd in August 2012.

‘We are thrilled to have the support of the Co-operative Membership again,’ said Brassed On York director Kate Lock. ’It’s a real expression of confidence in us that they want to fund the festival again, and it makes such a difference for us as an organisation.

‘Most importantly, it means we can pay all the eight local brass bands that are taking part in the festival, which is something we always aim to do. Brass bands need, and deserve, recompense for their playing; they are businesses themselves and are facing challenges in the current economic climate like everyone else.’

Brass bands do a valuable job of encouraging the take up and teaching of brass and percussion instruments, usually free of charge, to all ages. They also play a crucial role in the community, turning out for parades, commemorative and celebratory occasions as well as entertaining the public with performances and concerts.

‘They really add to the vibrancy and colour of life in York, and we are lucky to have so many good bands here,’ said Kate.

‘Thanks to The Co-operative Membership’s generosity, we can put on a really good brass-band showcase in Parliament Street on Saturday 29 June and show residents and visitors what York’s brass bands can do!’

The organisers are also grateful to Co-operative Funeralcare, which co-sponsored last year’s Proms in the Gardens and is also giving its support for Brassed On York 2013.

Brassed On York Ltd regrets to announce that Tubarama: the Tuba World Record Challenge has been postponed until 2014 at the earliest.

The event was due to take place on Sunday 30 June 2013 at York Racecourse as part of the Brassed On York Festival, with the aim of breaking the world record for the largest tuba ensemble.

Unfortunately, we did not have a sufficient expression from tuba and euphonium players to give us confidence that such an ambitious event was viable.

We would like to thank all those players that did contact us regarding the event and are sorry to disappoint those that had been planning to attend. If you would like to see Tubarama happen in the future, we need to build a bedrock of support for the event as a tuba/euphonium festival and would appreciate early indications in favour of it.

More details on the Tubarama website

Brassed On York is loving the fact that Robbie Williams featured eight dancing tuba-players in his performance of Candy at The Brits 2013 …

Unusual as it is to see eight tubas rocking out at the O2 – or anywhere – we will be needing a great deal more tubas than that if we are to break the Guinness World Record for the largest tuba ensemble in York on 30 June.

So, if you’re a tuba player, or a euphonium player, or a sousaphone player (they all count, as do marching tubas), get yourself down to the Racecourse in York for Tubarama, which is going to be big and brassy in all senses of the word!

All brass players  are welcome – there will be a massed brass finale to join in with – and there will be entertainment, trade stands and a chance to be a part of something really rather special.

To enter, we need you to pre-register on our Eventbrite booking page – go to our separate Tubarama website, which has all the details on it, and follow the link for bookings.

Shiny suits not necessary – but you do need to be able to actually play your instrument. If you can dance with it too, we’ll sign you up as an act!