THE Beatles may have sang ‘It was 20 years ago today, Sgt Pepper taught the band to play’, but it was about 30 years ago today that 18 young bands were feverishly rehearsing and polishing their performances for the first-ever York Inter-Schools Battle of the Bands, to be held at the prestigious Barbican Centre.
Burnholme Community College had run an in-house event for three years, for bands who had formed within the college, with small prizes, and parents, classmates and friends there to support.
Two people were heavily involved in this – Tina Wright, the college’s head of performing arts, who had overall responsibility for the event, and was no stranger to putting young people on the stage and extracting their best performances, and myself, technician at the school, who had been involved with local music for some time. Both felt the time was right to extend this event to other schools, especially as Popshop and Megajam had also nurtured local talent in the past.
Colloquial in Battle of the Bands 1997. Image supplied
How it all began
The basic aims of a wider competition would be to support and encourage local school bands by giving them a platform to perform their music in a professional setting and share each other’s work.
Many of the bands were not able to do this in their own schools for various reasons: lack of time, resources, support etc, but this event would be professionally run, and the outcome would be that a spark would be generated which meant that the bands might go on to pursue a meaningful career in music.
The growth and support of the school event encouraged the organisers to think big. Why not the Barbican Centre? Sure, it would be a huge commitment of money, time and resources, but if successful, would give school bands an opportunity they might never have again to feel, play and perform like a “real” professional band.
The City of York Council were approached for the venue hire, but were unprepared to foot the bill for an untried event – consequently the full costs would have to be met by the two organisers. This was a massive financial undertaking considering tickets would have to mirror the ability of school students to purchase them, but both Tina and I felt the risk was worth taking. Thursday June 27,1996 became the projected date, and there could be no going back.
First Battle of the Bands
Invitations went out to all schools, both pre- and post 16, state and private, and the response was amazing. Some 18 bands replied, all stating that they were good enough to enter the competition.
Well, OK, we thought, but we needed to meet all of them before the gig, just to make sure they hadn’t just picked up a guitar a week ago! And the criteria was very strict – six minutes only to perform, two songs preferable, original songs written by the band even more preferable, a professional attitude to performing live, and two categories – 16 and under, and 16 and over.
And the bands would be judged – this was 10 years before Britain’s Got Talent, or Pop Idol. Six members of York’s music scene with a wealth of experience behind them would mark each band on their performance using judging sheets where they could make comments –which would be fed back to the contestants to be used to improve their performances in the future.
The timings were tight – the judges would not have much time to mark, assess and comment on 18 bands, but the turnaround on stage as one band went off and another set up would hopefully give them the time they needed. As Tina began to look at the logistics of the event – tickets, seating, refreshments, dressing rooms, running order etc, I turned my attention to judges, backstage and prizes.
Meet the Battle of the Bands judges
Judges were no problem – I recruited Rob Parker, Steve Morrison and Gina Dootson, all successful local musicians, Paul Isaacs and Marysia Koc, both accomplished singer-songwriters, and Catherine Asbridge, entertainments manager at the Barbican Centre.
Rob Parker recalls the judging process: “I remember the judging sheet was very comprehensive – which I appreciated as a musician because all the bands were so diverse. There were only six minutes to watch, grade and assess, and then about three minutes to write a detailed summary which drew on my own experience and would be used to help and support the performers. I seemed to spend the whole show writing!”
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For prizes, it was agreed that anything donated must further good practice and give the bands something that they may not otherwise have access to – consequently there were studio sessions and vouchers for equipment rather than cash.
York’s amazing musical community rallied round – recording time was donated by four local studios: Submarine, Old Dairy Studios, IC in Tollerton, and Canon Lee School (which had their own studio at that time), and other prizes were made up of equipment vouchers, PA hire, free rehearsal space, and a Mystery Prize from York’s very own youngsters–made–good, Shed Seven!
And so it was, that 6 months of careful planning paid off – the evening was a resounding success, all the bands enjoyed the experience, and each band went away with constructive comments about how to improve their performance the following year.
Second Battle of the Bands
York’s second Inter-Schools Battle Of The Bands was immediately confirmed by the organisers, running with the same successful format, albeit with a couple of changes. Now the bands got eight minutes to showcase their talent, and Mark Fordyce from The Mood, (RCA recording artists) was a guest judge.
New prizes added to the usual array of recording time and equipment vouchers were two presentation “ Gold “ discs, from Norwich Union and Nestle. Following in Shed Seven’s footsteps, albums and T-shirts were donated by another famous York band, The Seahorses.
For this rerun, 15 young bands performed, which made it easier on the backstage crew, plus a guest spot from BRACE, the Under 16 winners of the previous year.
Memories from Battle of the Bands
Peter Watson, drummer with Huntington School’s entry, Colloquial, remembers: “The first year, we came second to a band called Brace, and we played I Feel Fine as a cover, and Life as an original song. The second year we won it, with Picturesque as an original and Jumping Jack Flash as a cover. We were presented with the Gold Disc donated by Nestle with a photo of the band. The following year we were invited back as winners, and played Find The Time as an original, and Purple Haze as the cover. We then went on to compete in the Fibbers version of the competition.”
Charlie Daykin, compiler of YorKmusic and a talented musician, was enlisted as a judge. He remembers the event well. “Even with the experience of my music tutoring days at Access To Music, it was very hard to judge and grade. You could only create an accurate assessment of one band against another if they all were given the same rehearsal time/resources and support. Also, with the first two bands marked and assessed, I had to keep referring back to make sure I was judging all the others fairly. But it was a fantastic showcase for young talent, which was the main thing, and the social aspect and atmosphere of playing in front of family and friends at the Barbican was a once in a lifetime experience.”
Legacy of Battle of the Bands
The event was covered by Richard Stead and Mark Brayshaw for Minster FM, and by the end of the two year run, more than 170 young musicians had been given the chance to perform in a professional setting in front of a 2,000-strong audience, and had received help, feedback and prizes which would further their musical careers.
With a successful track record now established, the City of York Council came on board, waiving the hire costs, and two more yearly competitions followed in 1998 and 1999, using the same tried-and-tested formula. Guest judges included Tim Hornsby (who by this time was running his own Battle of the Bands at Fibbers), Chris Johnson from Scheerers Music Shop in Leeds, and Hayley Hutchinson, who had carved out a solo career after taking part in 1996.
And so it was, after four years, Tina and I stepped down. The Battle Of The Bands baton was handed over to City of York Council to take forward, but in those four years all the aims and objectives of the organisers had been met.
More than 200 musicians and 4,000 people had been involved; all bands had been given professional feedback to help them move forward, and York’s music scene had gained a solid foundation of talented young bands to take it into the next century.
John Fletcher is admin of the popular Facebook group, York Bands Of The Past. You can request to join the group here: www.facebook.com/groups/221317005977259/?locale=en_GB.
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