Black Dyke Band
Encyclopedia
The Black Dyke Band, formerly the Black Dyke Mills Band, is one of the oldest and best-known brass band
Brass band (British style)
A British-style brass band is a musical ensemble comprising a standardised range of brass and percussion instruments. The modern form of the brass band in the United Kingdom dates back to the 19th century, with a vibrant tradition of competition based around local industry and communities...

s in the world. The band has won many prizes and competitions over the years. In 2009, the band won the National Brass Band Championships of Great Britain for a record 22nd time.

History

It was formerly the band of the Black Dyke Mills in Queensbury
Queensbury, West Yorkshire
Queensbury is a village in the metropolitan borough of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. Perched on a high vantage point above Clayton and Thornton and overlooking Bradford itself, Queensbury is one of the highest parishes in England, with fine views beyond the West Yorkshire conurbation to the...

, West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, a company owned by John Foster. Foster, a French horn player, joined with others in a small brass and reed band in Queensbury in 1816. This band faltered, and another band formed - called the Queenshead Band - which consisted of 18 musicians around 1843. This second band also faltered, but in 1855, Foster and other musicians established the new mill band, and outfitted it with uniforms made from the mill's own cloth. Most of the musicians in the band also worked at the mill, and a close bond was fostered with the local community. The band has remained active since that time, and still rehearses in its original rooms.

Black Dyke was the first band to achieve the "Grand Slam" in 1985 by winning the Yorkshire regional, European, British Open and National Championship contests. They were also voted BBC Band of the Year.

Recordings

The Black Dyke Band has made over 300 recordings, including one of the first brass band recordings in 1904 and classical music. It has recorded with classical bass trombonist
Trombone
The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...

 Douglas Yeo
Douglas Yeo
Douglas Yeo is bass trombonist in the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where he holds the John Moors Cabot Bass Trombone Chair...

, and pop acts Tori Amos
Tori Amos
Tori Amos is an American pianist, singer-songwriter and composer. She was at the forefront of a number of female singer-songwriters in the early 1990s and was noteworthy early in her career as one of the few alternative rock performers to use a piano as her primary instrument...

, Peter Gabriel
Peter Gabriel
Peter Brian Gabriel is an English singer, musician, and songwriter who rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career...

 and The Beautiful South
The Beautiful South
The Beautiful South were an English alternative rock group formed at the end of the 1980s by two former members of Hull group The Housemartins, Paul Heaton and Dave Hemingway. The duo were initially joined by Sean Welch , Dave Stead and Dave Rotheray , all of whom stayed with the group throughout...

. The band also worked with Gabriel on the highly acclaimed Millennium Show, featured in the Millennium Dome
Millennium Dome
The Millennium Dome, colloquially referred to simply as The Dome or even The O2 Arena, is the original name of a large dome-shaped building, originally used to house the Millennium Experience, a major exhibition celebrating the beginning of the third millennium...

, as well as recording the music for the BBC programme Ground Force
Ground Force
Ground Force was a British garden makeover television series originally broadcast by the BBC between 1997 and 2005. The series was originally hosted by Alan Titchmarsh, Charlie Dimmock and Tommy Walsh and was produced by Endemol for the BBC.-Production:...

.

In September 1968, the band released a single on The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...

Apple Records
Apple Records
Apple Records is a record label founded by The Beatles in 1968, as a division of Apple Corps Ltd. It was initially intended as a creative outlet for the Beatles, both as a group and individually, plus a selection of other artists including Mary Hopkin, James Taylor, Badfinger, and Billy Preston...

 label. The A-side was an instrumental composed by Lennon/McCartney
Lennon/McCartney
The Lennon–McCartney songwriting partnership is one of the best-known and most successful musical collaborations in history...

 called "Thingumybob" (the theme to a Yorkshire Television
Yorkshire Television
Yorkshire Television, now officially known as ITV Yorkshire and sometimes unofficially abbreviated to YTV, is a British television broadcaster and the contractor for the Yorkshire franchise area on the ITV network...

 sitcom of the same name starring Stanley Holloway
Stanley Holloway
Stanley Augustus Holloway, OBE was an English stage and film actor, comedian, singer, poet and monologist. He was famous for his comic and character roles on stage and screen, especially that of Alfred P. Doolittle in My Fair Lady...

). The flipside was a brass band instrumental version of another Lennon/McCartney
Lennon/McCartney
The Lennon–McCartney songwriting partnership is one of the best-known and most successful musical collaborations in history...

 song, "Yellow Submarine
Yellow Submarine (song)
"Yellow Submarine" is a 1966 song by The Beatles, written by Paul McCartney , with lead vocals by Ringo Starr. It was included on the Revolver album and issued as a single, coupled with "Eleanor Rigby". The single went to number 1 on every major British chart, remained at number 1 for four weeks...

". The single was released under the name John Foster & Sons Ltd Black Dyke Mills Band, produced by McCartney, and was one of the first four singles issued on the Apple label. In 1979, the Black Dyke Mills Band worked again with McCartney on a track for the Wings
Wings (band)
Wings were a British-American rock group formed in 1971 by Paul McCartney, Denny Laine and Linda McCartney that remained active until 1981....

 album Back to the Egg
Back to the Egg
Back to the Egg is the seventh and final studio album by Wings, released in 1979. It is also Wings' first album for Columbia Records after leaving long-time United States distributor Capitol Records in 1978...

.

In August 2009, the band undertook a tour of Australia with multi-instrumentalist James Morrison
James Morrison (musician)
James Morrison AM is an Australian jazz musician who plays numerous instruments, but is best known for his trumpet playing...

 which culminated in a concert at the Sydney Opera House
Sydney Opera House
The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in the Australian city of Sydney. It was conceived and largely built by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, finally opening in 1973 after a long gestation starting with his competition-winning design in 1957...

.

Notable members

The principals of the band's current line up include:
  • Principal Cornet: Richard Marshall
  • Principal Euphonium: Gary Curtin
  • Principal Trombone: Brett Baker
  • Bass Trombone: Adrian Hirst
  • Soprano Cornet: Paul Duffy
  • Principal Horn: Sheona White
  • Flugel Horn: Zoe Hancock
  • Principal Eb Bass: Joseph Cook
  • Principal Bb Bass: Matthew Routley
  • Principal Percussionist: Andrea Price


The band's current Principal Conductor and Director of Music is the Welsh euphonium
Euphonium
The euphonium is a conical-bore, tenor-voiced brass instrument. It derives its name from the Greek word euphonos, meaning "well-sounding" or "sweet-voiced"...

 virtuoso, Dr. Nicholas Childs. His predecessor was trumpet player James Watson
James Watson (trumpeter)
Professor James Watson FRAM held principal trumpet posts with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Opera House and London Sinfonietta. His international chamber music work included the Nash Ensemble and leading the world-famous Philip Jones Brass Ensemble...

.

Paul Lovatt-Cooper
Paul Lovatt-Cooper
Paul Lovatt-Cooper is "Composer in Association" of the Black Dyke Band of which he was also formerly a percussionist.Coming from a Salvation Army family, he studied music at the University of Salford...

 is the band's Composer in Association and former principal percussionist. He retired from playing in early 2011 in order to concentrate on his teaching, conducting and composition.

The Black Dyke Band is the brass band in residence at the Royal Northern College of Music
Royal Northern College of Music
The Royal Northern College of Music is a music school in Manchester, England. It is located on Oxford Road in Chorlton on Medlock, at the western edge of the campus of the University of Manchester and is one of four conservatories associated with the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music...

 in Manchester, and Childs also conducts the RNCM Brass Band.

External links


Audio clips

  • Variations on Laudate Dominum by Edward Gregson
    Edward Gregson
    Edward Gregson is an English composer of international standing, whose music has been performed, broadcast, and recorded worldwide. He was born in Sunderland, England, in 1945. He studied composition and piano at the Royal Academy of Music from 1963-7, winning five prizes for composition...

    .
  • Theme to Ground Force
    Ground Force
    Ground Force was a British garden makeover television series originally broadcast by the BBC between 1997 and 2005. The series was originally hosted by Alan Titchmarsh, Charlie Dimmock and Tommy Walsh and was produced by Endemol for the BBC.-Production:...

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