A Retrospective view of 2002

The band has had another full year carrying out 48 concerts, 5 contests, 2 recordings and 2 tours, one to Australia and one to Luxembourg, and all this with a month off in August.

In total the band entertained in the region of 70,000 people, hopefully all satisfied and maybe we’ll see some of them in 2003.

The band played the length and breadth of the country from Spennymoor in County Durham down to Yeovil in Somerset and Bournemouth on the south coast where we carried out a concert on the Saturday evening and a masterclass on Sunday to all ages of aspiring bands people.

We carried out our regular concerts such as Gawsworth Hall near Macclesfield for Timothy Richards, three nights of Pomp and Valour in those Last Night of the Proms style concerts with all three nights selling out, and two of our very few Christmas Concerts at Selby Abbey and Market Deeping.

The big concerts of the year were carried out at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London conducted by our Musical Advisor Elgar Howarth in an evening of Old, Contempary and modern works to show the London Opera set what a Brass Band can do.  We also performed at a full concert at Birmingham Symphony Hall and two at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester.

We decided this year to start promoting our own concerts and therefore Sheffield City Hall was booked and gained a very respectable 1,700 audience to be entertained by band and choir combinations, such was the success that we will be repeating this venture next year.

Contesting has been a very mixed bag for the band this year, starting with a second place at the Yorkshire Areas playing Whitsun Wakes conducted by James Gourlay and qualifying for the National finals at the Royal Albert Hall in October.  We seemed to falter at the British Open only gaining a disappointing 14th place playing Maunsell Forts a new work by John McCabe.  October saw the band travelling to the Royal Albert Hall in London to take part in the National Finals.  The band did a little better than the Open, getting just outside the prizes with 7^th place playing Masquerade by Philip Wilby.  A weekend of contests took place over the 16^th and 17^th November.  On Saturday the band yet again won the Mineworkers Championships for the 19^th consecutive time playing Essence of Time. 

Sunday saw the band retain its Spennymoor Brass in Concert title for the 11th time in the contests history, conducted by Garry Cutt.  As well as the Quality of performance and Entertainment and Presentations awards the band also picked up Best Euphonium (Michael Dodd), Best March (New Colonial) and the Winning Conductor Prize (Garry Cutt).  We must add our thanks to Sandy Smith (the Bands Arranger in Residence) for providing 5 of the bands 7 pieces for Spennymoor and this not counting the solo Evergreen which he performed.

It was a good year for Garry Cutt as he was the  latest recipient of the Iles Medal issued annually by the Worshipful Company of Musicians.

There have been a few player changes this year, notably the bass section.  At the beginning of the year we had Dean Morley from Fodens on solo BBb, Gary Proctor, from YBS on Assistant BBb, Jon Davies from YBS on Principle Eb and Shaun Crowther on Assistant Eb, unfortunately Jon had to resign due to work commitments.  Shaun was moved up to principle Eb and the assistant slot was filled by Richard Wilton from Sellers Band.  Andrew Snell, the bands bass trombone player took a shine to New Zealand after our tour there in 2001 and decided to emigrate there at the beginning of this year.  Andy’s position was filled by Toby Bannan from Fodens.  The final player change was made in July with the resignation of Jonathon Sanderson on 2^nd Cornet, he was replaced by Greg Knowles from Glossop Band.  Unfortunately Greg resigned in December as he has been accepted into the Police Force, this position remains vacant a the moment.

The band completed 2 recordings this year.  One for Doyen, backing our Professional Conductor, James Gourlay, playing a collection of Tuba solos called "East meets West".  The second recording was for SP&S completed in September entitled “Grimethorpe in Concert” it features many of the pieces included in the bands concert programmes throughout the year and was released in December.

The band carried out 2 tours this year, one in July to Luxembourg.  A very relaxed affair playing in the market area called Place De Armes over a long weekend.  Our major tour this year was yet again to Australia for the third time in four years.  Although a tiring tour of twelve consecutive concerts with only one day off on our arrival it was nice for the band not to travel round much and actually attempt to see what Australia has to offer.  The tour started on the 27^th May, comprised of three concerts in Perth, then one in Adelaide, three in Melbourne and one each in Sydney, Reversby, Newcastle, Canberra and finishing in a 3,000 seater stadium in Brisbane.  We played to in excess of 20,000 people on this tour and the reaction was fantastic.  It looks like we may not be returning to Australia for the next couple of years, with tours in Switzerland and America, (finishing in the Carnegie Hall in New York) already organised for 2003, and another tour of America in the planning stages for 2004.

We would like to thank for sponsoring the band this year and for you the audience for coming to support the band and listen to us perform.

As Frank Renton used to say “It would have been a hell of a distance to travel for a rehearsal”