|
Tredegar Town Band |
|
During the 1920s and 1930s the Band was known as the Tredegar Workmen’s Silver Prize Band and was of a standard and potential to attract conductors from the North of England willing to move to the Tredegar area to conduct the Band on a permanent basis.
Eli Shaw Snr. was one such conductor, who relocated to Tredegar in the 1920’s and encouraged his sons Eli and Vic to become brass players. Eli remained a competent cornet player and a valuable member of the solo cornet bench from the mid 1940s until the mid 1960s when he retired from playing.
During the 1930s, the standard of the Band improved, but they did not achieve championship section status. Sam Mountfield lived in Blaina and conducted the Band from the early 1930s until the end of the Second World War. The 1930s saw the Band competing at the renowned Crystal Palace Band Festival and at the Belle Vue ( Manchester) Spring Festival. Closer to home, the band entered contests at Fairford (Glos), the Forest of Dean and Bridgewater ( Somerset). These events were usually held in the open air at park bandstands and specially erected stages in open areas and fields.
March and Deportment contests were a feature of many local events, both as a prelude to the main contest and attracting local audiences to the venue. The band did not gain any major successes in these contest.
Three brothers – Billy, Tommy and Harold Thomas were influential players in the band in the late 1930’s and early 1940’s. Billy Thomas became Principal Cornet of one of Wales’ leading bands – Melingriffith Works Band, with Tommy filling the Principal Cornet chair at Tredegar until 1944. Harold remained as Principal Trombone until 1950.
In the late 1930s Con Buckley – who was the Band’s Solo Trombonist (previously solo euphonium) and a regular prize winner at the many solo contests that were held in South and West Wales at that time, became the Assistant Conductor, eventually succeeding Sam Mountfield as MD in 1944. |
|
The History (1920 - 1940) |
