Lostock Hall and Freckleton brass bands to go head to head in National Brass Band Championships
Lostock Memorial Band showed top brass to be named winners in the regional band championships, which alongside Freckleton Brass Band will see them take to the stage in Cheltenham for the first section national finals in September.
Spokesperson for the Lostock band Jean Heyes said members were thrilled with the result, with the band’s players ranging in age from 11 to 79. She said: “This is a great achievement for our band. The cost of this is certainly going to be a huge mountain to climb financially and we would kindly ask anyone willing to help sponsor or donate to contact us. We shall be performing around the area during the forthcoming months to raise funds so please watch out for dates.”
Paul Dalton, musical director for Freckleton Brass Band, said: “This is the third time in five years the band has qualified for the finals. The North West is often regarded as having the strongest first section in the country, and therefore the hardest to achieve in. This result is particularly satisfying in that it is nice to see that ensuring the basics of good music making is still recognised and rewarded in contests.”
Taking part in his first regional contest was 14-year-old percussionist George Cobham, who joined Freckleton Band last May.
He said: “I really enjoyed the experience of performing in my first area contest and I’m looking forward to the trip to Cheltenham in September. We did Brass Metamorphosis by James Cunrow, which was a challenging piece with some tricky percussion parts that required a lot of hard work to get right. As a band we’ve rehearsed a lot on the piece over the last few weeks and it was great that all the hard work paid off.”