RNCM Brass Band Festival marks Gregson's 75th Birthday
11th November 2019
The Royal Northern College of Music’s annual Brass Band Festival is always a highlight of the year, attracting some of the UK’s leading groups and their fans. This January, bands such as Black Dyke, Tredegar, Cory and Foden’s will pay tribute to Edward Gregson in his 75th year with performances of his music.
Held across the January 24 weekend, four separate concerts will feature music by Gregson. The world renowned Foden’s Band open the festival with Dances and Arias on the Friday evening, with another Novello name featuring on the programme Ubi Caritas by Paul Mealor. The Black Dyke Band, long-standing advocates for Gregson’s work, perform his most complex work for the genre Symphony in two movements the next evening at the RNCM Concert Hall. A highly engaging and dramatic work, the symphony takes inspiration from the form of Beethoven’s final piano sonata (Op.111): a compact sonata-form allegro, followed by a more expansive theme and four variations. They close with excepts from The Age of Kings*.
On Sunday 26, the 2019 Welsh and Double British Open Champions Tredegar Town Band, perform the Roccoco Variations* in a lunchtime concert. The Cory Band conclude the festival that evening with Gregson’s 1992 work inspired by a journey over The Rockies, Of Men and Mountains.
Click here for more information or to purchase tickets
Friday, January 24
FODEN'S BAND
7.30pm – 9.30pm // RNCM Concert Hall
Edward Gregson: Dances and Arias
Granville Bantock: Prometheus Unbound
John Pickard: Eden
Oliver Waespi: The Raid
Paul Mealor: Ubi Caritas
Philip Wilby: Paginini Variations
Saturday, January 25
BLACK DYKE BAND
7.30pm – 9.30pm // RNCM Concert Hall
Andy Wareham: God from the Machine
Peter Graham: Turbulence, Tide and Torque
Edward Gregson: Symphony in two movements
Philip Wilby: A Pilgrim’s Progress
Oliver Waespi: Scene Change
Edward Gregson: The Age of Kings (excerpts)
Sunday, January 26
TREDEGAR TOWN BAND with PHILIP COBB
3.15pm - 4.30pm // RNCM Concert Hall
Richard Strauss: Solemn Processional
Daniel Hall: A Dialogue of Transmogrified Souls
Ernest Tomlinson: Cornet Concerto
Edward Gregson: Rococo Variations
Sunday, January 26
CORY BAND with ALISA RUSSELL
6.30pm – 7.45pm // RNCM Concert Hall
Christopher Bond: The Lost Village of Imber
Edward Gregson: Of Men and Mountains
Philip Wilby: Fantasia Concertante
Paul Raphael: Explorers on the Moon
* works published by Studio Music - available here
