GEORGE BUTTON is keeping fingers crossed that hundreds of folk will turn up for his 70th birthday bash on Saturday.
To mark his big day he is promoting a charity concert in St John's Church, Lepton.
George, a musician for 61 years, is a brass player, and music at this birthday concert is to be provided by the Yorkshire Volunteers Band, of which he has been a member for the past couple of years. He plays the euphonium.
Proceeds from the evening are in aid of the British Limbless Ex-Servicemen's Association (BLESMA). George, an amputee, lost a leg in a car accident some 40 or so years ago. His military service saw him in Berlin during the height of the Cold War and in Kenya at the time of the Mau Mau uprising.
In addition to his music-making, which has taken him to the top in the British brass band movement, George has many other talents.
He lives in the former Lepton Primitive Methodist Chapel which was built in 1835 and closed in 1935. For 10 years George used the building as a store place for his business, then he and his wife Margaret decided to take on the mammoth task of converting the place into a home. "I`ve done quite a few jobs in my time, mainly carpet fitting," he said, "but working on the building tested all of my skills."
When he took over the old building it was little more than four walls and a roof. Everything had been stripped out when the chapel closed and the congregation moved into a new place of worship not too far away.
It took George many months of back-breaking work to bring the building back to life, and there was nothing else to do in that time but roll up the sleeves and get stuck in.
Now the building is home to a beautiful pulpit which is set overlooking the spacious lounge. The pulpit, pitch pine doors and panelling George rescued from a church at Denholme.
Downstairs is another piece of fine furniture which he rescued from another redundant church, this time in Morley. It's a 13ft-long cupboard in which all the hymn books were once stored. George fitted glass doors and it now shows off some of the family's glass and china collection.
George and Margaret have lived in the former chapel for 20 years, and in that time a great deal of thought and work has been put into making what was once nothing more than a shell into a most comfortable home.
"When we decided to convert the building into a house there were certain conditions which had to be met. For instance, it states in the deeds that alcohol can never be sold on the premises. It can be drunk or given away, but not sold," said George.
He was born in Goole and the family later lived in Wakefield for some years. His father, Horace, and brother Peter, were both brass players. In the years that followed George, like his father and brother, also played the tuba.
"I remember when I was a youngster my father coming home from band practice one evening with a battered cornet lodged down the bell-end of the bass. Both my brother and I learned to play on that old instrument."
George began his banding career with Wakefield Old Band and went on to reach the peak of his musical career when he was with the Yorkshire Imperial Metals when the band twice won the British Open Championship at the old Belle Vue and then the National Brass Band Championship in the Royal Albert Hall.
Having a life-long interest in music and brass in particular, almost 20 years ago George decided to further that interest by returning to college and advance his musical studies. In the late 1980s, under the leadership of cornet virtuoso Phillip McCann, the Huddersfield Tecol Band was launched taking in students then at the Technical College and also the Polytechnic. George returned to the classroom as a mature student, playing bass and then becoming a member of the Tecol Band.
Looking at a band photograph from that time, he said: "Look at me, an old man among all those young people."
The Yorkshire Volunteers Band was given a new lease of life when the Service band was disbanded a few years ago. It has within its ranks of about 40 personnel a full military-style band which will be on duty at the Lepton concert on November 6, and whenever required the organisation can also put on show a jazz band and a line of fanfare trumpeters. All come under the direction of Major Jack Bowden, of Huddersfield.
Tickets for George`s birthday concert (it's a 7.30 start) are just £3 each, and are available by phoning him on Huddersfield 607880. They will also be available at the door.
