Vying for success at Grand Pavilion
BURRY Port Town Band started as the Elliots Smelting Works Band around 1896 and they will be taking part in the Welsh Open on February 16 at the Grand Pavilion, Porthcawl.
Like many bands during the wars it disbanded and was reformed in 1972.
The band reached the Championship section in 2000 and since that time the band has been the Welsh League Champion Band on seven occasions, won the Welsh Eisteddfod four times and has represented Wales at the National finals in the Royal Albert Hall three times.
In 2005 they were victorious at the British Open Senior Cup at the Winter Gardens Blackpool.
The band won the Welsh Open Entertainment title in 2015.
Burry Port has a junior band and the young players are supplied with an instrument and tutored entirely free.
The juniors rehearse from 5pm-6pm each Sunday evening.
There is a very strong English presence in this, the 22nd Welsh Open with nearly half of the 14 competitors coming from the other side of the bridge.
The current Welsh Open Champions, Filton Concert are quite close coming from Bristol as is AW Parker Drybrook who hail from the Forest of Dean, but further away in the Midlands is Enderby and from the other side of England is Haverhill and Thundersley.
Haverhill is a thriving market town on the Suffolk/Cambridgeshire border and has had a band from the early 1800s.
The present band got its name in the 1950s.
The band began contesting in the 1970s and got to the 3rd Section National Finals in 1983 and reached Champion- ship section in 2000 and has been a championship band for the last five years.
Haverhill has competed in the Championship section of the Butlin’s Mineworkers Brass Festival for the past three years and along with their M D Paul Filby, who was principal trombone with GUS for many years, are looking forward to competing at the Welsh Open for the first time.
It is interesting to point out that at this year’s Butlin’s Festival Haverhill was actually placed third on the test piece which was Carnival, the overture, (behind Desford Colliery (Michael Fowles), the winners and Woodfalls (Dr Robert Childs).
The entertainment sections let them down by causing the multi media technical crew too many problems. They had bad luck at Butlins and will certainly be looking for a good result at Porthcawl.
The results of the Championship Section at Butlins were: 1st. Desford Colliery (LMTF); 2nd. Friary Brass (Chris King); 3rd. Woodfalls(Dr Robert Childs); 4th. Flowers(Paul Holland); 5th. Virtuosi GUS(Chris Jeans); 6th. Redbridge Brass (Richard Ward); and 7th. Haverhill Silver (Paul Filby).
Thundersley Brass Band is based in South Benfleet, south Essex, and is a Championship Section band who represent- ed London and Southern Counties at the 2018 National Championships in the Royal Albert Hall, under the baton of Nigel Taken, where they finished just ahead of both City of Cardiff (M1) and Tongwynlais Temperance.
Conducting the band at the Welsh Open will be Melvin White who has also agreed to conduct them at the approaching London and Southern Counties Regional contest in March 2019.
They could certainly be one of the podium finishers.