On Sunday September 29th, the morning after many of the band finished an amazing month of performing in Brassed Off at the Octagon Theatre, we took to the stage at St Michael’s Academy in Chorley for the first ever Red Admiral Entertainment Contest. Unfortunately for us, out of the 17 bands entered in the Second Section, three bands withdrew and we were drawn to play from the dreaded No.1 slot to a freezing cold, largely empty hall, but our performance was superb and the adjudicator comments thankfully effusive.

The theme for our Red Admiral entry was a fiftieth birthday tribute to Robbie Williams, with almost all of the music taken from his iconic 2001 CD and Royal Albert Hall project Swing When You’re Winning. With a time limit of twenty minutes from first note to last, our MD Chris Wormald put together a seamless programme which featured individual soloists, our Flugel Horn quartet, various players moving about the stage, solos to be played from memory standing up or from music seated, a pre-recorded voiceover narration by London-based actor Jordan John, a standing finish with the full band pointing instruments out to the front and a superb audio visual presentation throughout the whole set brilliantly put together by our Timpani and Percussionist Dom Patel which featured amazing graphics, photographs of band members, Children In Need with Vernon Kay and Zoe Ball and a closing, scrolling up the screen ‘end credits’ sequence with every player named and all programme information. Everything was streamed ‘live’ on the internet too, to the world at large.

Our programme opened with just Leo Turner-Patel playing solo on drums whilst the whole band walked on to the stage in formation, dressed in all black and with the men wearing black hats with white ribbon trim, as featured in the Robbie Williams Royal Albert Hall concert. Principal Cornet Lynsey Hayes was the first featured soloist in Mack The Knife, later followed our Chair and Solo Horn Deb Lyons in One For My Baby and finally our Flugel Horn quartet of Lynsey Hayes, Becca Crompton, Hollie Lancaster and Janet Walsh in the penultimate piece of the set, My Way.

Everything worked perfectly from Leo’s perfect solo opening to the full, standing close and the adjudicator comments were appropriately impressive throughout; “Fabulous to see a whole suite of new music for brass band, thank you!” “Great Solo Cornet, great style, lovely sound and real character,” “Fantastic transitions and style changes, well done MD,” “Well played Solo Horn, you have a terrific sound,” “Terrific intonation in the Flugel quartet,” “Fab Solo Cornet again,” “Great Bass sounds,” “Sweet sounding Flugel Horn,” “Nicely balanced throughout,” “Great Bass Trombone,” “The carillon works beautifully with great band support,” “Excellent percussion throughout, you had a really big part to play today and you did this with style an aplomb,” ” Great dynamics throughout,” “Great discipline,” “Flugel lovely,” “Great razzy Bass Trombone in the final refrain,” “Great programme, well directed and really enjoyed it,” “The ending works really well visually and musically,” “A really enjoyable set, thank you all!” “Featured soloists did an excellent job,” “Excellent percussion and super sounds as a whole from everyone.”

After such great comments and compliments it was a shame that almost ten hours after we had played, when results were finally announced, we were placed 8th, but it had been a great performance by everyone in the band and our programme was both unique and clearly found favour with the judges, so a good and proud day was had by everyone.