Friary Diary - Issue 134 - April 2026

Welcome to Friary Diary issue 134 - a monthly round up of news about the Friary Brass Band.

GRAND SHIELD CONTEST:

Friary returned from the British Open Spring Festival Grand Shield contest last Sunday with heads held high.  In the new venue of Birmingham Town Hall, the Band was awarded a highly creditable 7th place out of the 20 competitors.  Coincidentally, Friary was band no. 7 in the programme, and drawn to play seventh.

The test piece was Stephen Roberts’ Star Crossed Lovers - by his own admission, a highly challenging work - based on Sergei Prokofiev’s ballet, Romeo & Juliet.  Adjudicators Anne Crookston and the composer himself were clearly impressed with MD Captain Andrew Porter’s reading, summarising the performance respectively:

‘Although not 100% settled in balance and intonation in places, you painted a very convincing picture - especially the build to the finale.’

and

‘A fine performance, not without its flaws, but overall a well paced and musically nuanced reading.’

Band Chair David Wicks commented: ‘Although it would have been wonderful to have taken one of the top two places which would lift us into the British Open, realistically all we wanted was a result which reflected Andy’s meticulous preparation and the effort which everyone contributed to our performance.  Seventh place in a field of 20 quality bands was a very fair result which we feel we deserved, and we were the highest placed London & Southern Counties band too!’

Eventually winners were Milnrow, with Hepworth runners up, both of which will compete in the British Open at Symphony Hall, Birmingham in September:  congratulations to them.  For the full results, please visit 4barsrest.com.

Huge congratulations too to our friends at Sandhurst Silver who won the Spring Festival’s Senior Trophy contest on Saturday, all the more impressive as it was on their debut!  They will compete in the Senior Cup at next year’s Spring Festival. Also East London Brass who, after their 4th place finish in the Senior Cup, join Friary in the Grand Shield next year.

ENTENTE CORDIALE:

With the two major contests now behind us, we are now turning our focus to our summer concert season, which includes an exciting brand new event and venue:  our Entente Cordiale concert with Muriele French Singer in Old Alresford.

As the name suggests, the concert will comprise English and French music with this talented singer.  Muriele is a  native French  professional singer in wartime, jazz and retro songs from the 1920's onwards, transporting you to the Paris of yesteryear with chansons from Edith Piaf, Charles Trenet, Serge Gainsbourg, Charles Aznavour and many more.  

Muriele has performed with numerous artists including renowned New York City based gipsy jazz violinist, Adrien Chevalier and regularly delights audiences at public and private functions in Hampshire and the South coast as a soloist or with her accompanying musicians.  We are thrilled to be performing with her;  the concert is raising funds for St Mary’s Church, Old Alresford.

We very much hope you will join us.  Tickets (£20) are on sale now here.

GODALMING BANDSTAND:

Our concert season starts with the ever-popular Godalming Bandstand event on Sunday 17^th May at 3.00pm.  Again, we very much hope to see you there:  fingers crossed for good weather!

RANKING NEWS:

There has been no further update by 4barsrest.com to their world rankings table on 6^th January so Friary stays at 51^st.  Brassstats.com updated their table on 1^st March with Friary slipping a couple of places to 47th.