Far from brassed off
PERCHED high above the urban sprawl of Bradford, Queensbury is an unassuming village of typical Yorkshire stone terraces. Looming over the houses is the solitary, sooty chimney of the Black Dyke Mills, dormant since John Foster & Sons moved manufacturing of its cloth to more convenient premises in 1989. Foster & Sons has survived against all the odds and so has the brass band associated with its mill—the Black Dyke Band.
John Foster (1798–1879) wasn’t only a canny businessman and entrepreneur, he was also a rather good French-horn player. Foster and solemnly declared ‘were it not for the Brass Band (an institution so zealously cultivated), what an incomprehensible void would be created in the national recreation of our manufacturing and rural populations’.
