Five leading Championship Section bands have announced their collaboration on an innovative project to commission major compositions from established composers yet to have written for the medium.

Cory, Flowers, Foden's, the cooperation band and Tredegar alongside acclaimed orchestral conductor Martyn Brabbins aim to invite five renowned composers to write works which they will then give premiere performances across the UK.

Richard Blackford

The first is the Ivor Novello Award winning composer Richard Blackford, with discussions with future collaborators already underway.

Regarded as one of the foremost concert and media composers in Europe, 'Orbital' is named after author Samantha Harvey's 2024 Booker Prize, and Hawthornden Prize winning novel. It is also being supported and co-commissioned by BBC Radio 3.

Harvey's novel follows the work as well as reflections on the existence or nature of God, the meaning of life, and existential threats such as climate change, of six astronauts aboard the International Space Station as it orbits Earth.

The book also draws on the work and research of scientist and writer, Carl Sagan.

Thrilled

Speaking about the commission, his Richard Blackford said: "I'm thrilled to have been chosen to collaborate closely with five of the greatest brass bands in the world on 'Orbital'. The piece is virtuosic, full of drama and contrasts and, I hope — good tunes."

Schedules for the first performances of the work will be drawn up for performance by each band during 2026.

New ways

A spokesperson for the initiative stated: "We're delighted to be working together on this project. At several moments across brass band repertoire history, new voices have emerged which injected energy, innovation and new ways of thinking into our music.

Composers such as Gilbert Vinter, John McCabe and Philip Wilby were all well-established before they wrote for the brass band medium later in their careers with such huge and long-lasting impact."

I'm thrilled to have been chosen to collaborate closely with five of the greatest brass bands in the world on 'Orbital'. The piece is virtuosic, full of drama and contrasts and, I hope — good tunesRichard Blackford

Outside the movement

They added: "This initiative similarly aims to discover new creative voices from outside of the movement. We are aware that there is already a huge quantity of new music for brass band, but not such an abundance of quality.

One of the central objectives is to create music which other bands will listen to and want to programme themselves, and we are keen to work with each of the composers to introduce them to our musical world and advise them on what makes our most well-loved repertoire so frequently performed."

Radio 3 belief

The spokesperson concluded: "We are extremely grateful to BBC Radio 3 for their belief in this project and assistance in funding this co-commission.

Following the success of the series 'Brass Banding with Hannah Peel', it is fantastic to see a continued interest in supporting and programming music from brass bands in their broadcasting."