‘It’s a sound that will go down a storm in Marsden this weekend’
ONWARD and upward. It’s a big weekend for music fans with the start on Friday of the 17th Marsden Jazz Festival.
Few of the many festival performers will be playing with more pzazz and quiet pride than Elland-based The Anchormen Ensemble.
It’s the fourth year that the brass and rhythm of The Anchormen Ensemble will be heard in the Colne Valley. The musicians are thrilled to be playing in the centre of Marsden at noon on Sunday.
“We did one gig on the back of a truck and last year we were in a marquee up at Standedge. They were turning people away,” said Kevin Riley, who has been involved in banding since he was 11, a mere 23 years ago.
He’s typical of the profile of what seems to make an Anchorman, as is fellow musician Robin Barraclough, who admits to 34 years in banding, with no loss of appetite for a sound that will go down a storm in Marsden this weekend.
But The Anchormen Ensemble that pays tribute to the music of Stan Kenton and the big band sound of Buddy Rich is only part of a much wider Anchormen organisation.
The larger grouping has its roots in a long-established musical past but is working hard to interest a new generation of young musicians.
And it seems to be working.
“The Anchormen have been going for a lot of years in Elland. It was traditionally a marching band with links to the Boys’ Brigade and as things developed, they went into a drum and bugle corps,” said Robin.
The Anchormen are thought to be one of the oldest corps in the country, tracing their roots back to 1904, when the Boys’ Brigade arrived in Elland.
Within a year the company was enrolled and in uniform. Soon afterwards a drum and bugle band was parading through Elland in church parades and other events.
The band grew under the captaincy of Harold Savage and by 1932 had its own headquarters, the Harold Savage Hall which today is the base for The Anchormen.
The organisation includes not just the adult jazz ensemble but a junior section which sees youngsters learning music and movement skills.
It’s a signal that The Anchormen have adapted with the times. In the Sixties and Seventies they were at the forefront of the marching band scene, appearing on TV, representing England overseas and winning the national Boys’ Brigade Championship year after year.
As the Eighties approached so did the influence of American drum corps style.
And The Anchormen went with the new trend, including girls in the new-look corps and expanding their skills to compete in what is known as Winterguard.
Robin says: “We have a drum line and we have a Winterguard, which consists mainly of girls. But boys are very welcome and the age group is between seven and 25.
“They use flags and imitation rifles and perform a show to a piece of music.”
“It’s competitive certainly but it’s also great fun and gets youngsters involved in what is a real community.
“It’s about doing things as an organisation. We want people to come down and learn brass instruments, but for the youngsters the Winterguard offers more dance opportunities to modern rather than traditional music.”
“It shows the fun element and that, with a lot of hard work, becomes a company and a community,” he added.
The youngsters rehearse on Tuesday nights between 7 and 9pm and during the competitive season do some Sunday work, too. There are place for new members if anyone wants to join in.
The hall at Elland offers space for the drum corps to rehearse its music and its marching, for the Winterguard to go through its show-style paces, plus a bandroom where The Anchormen Ensemble can rehearse its big band sound.
For just as the junior sections of the organisation have adapted to changing times so too have the adult musicians whose skills will be on display in Marsden.
“We’ve stepped up a gear in our music too. There’s still an appetite for the music of Stan Kenton and from the best swing bands,” said Robin
The 20-plus piece band was formed nine years ago and combines brass players with a rhythm section. To the baritone and mellophone instruments (both Robin and Kevin play baritone) add trumpets, trombones, plus percussion, bass, guitar and piano.
Rachel Rothery is the band’s vocalist and Frank Wade, driving force behind the band, does all its musical arrangements.
Expect tunes such as Birdland, Gospel John, Aquarius, Pegasus and Hey Jude and echoes of both Kenton and of Maynard Ferguson.
And as you listen to The Anchormen Ensemble applaud an organisation that is doing its best to introduce a new generation to the community of banding, but with a very different style.
