Central Southern Area Fellowship Band
of the Salvation Army
Our Story
How it all started
The Central Southern Area Fellowship band was formed in 1996 following an initiative by Peter Barlow, the band′s retired secretary. The inaugural meeting of 20 interested people took place on 1st July of that year followed by another meeting at Maidenhead. It was later in the month, at Tadley, that the founding group played its first notes. In October the band gave its first concert at Reading West corps.
Membership
An unusual feature of the band is that it is made up of bandsmen from corps across multiple Divisions of the UK Territory. Oversight of the band is provided by the Headquarters of the Central South Division. Since the start of the band, all its Executive Officer′s have held appointments at that headquarters. The present executive officer retired as Divisional Director for Evangelism in August 2016 and now ministers part time as a lead Chaplain at Heathrow Airport.
The band bases its rules on Salvation Army bandsmen′s Regulations. However its membership is restricted to uniformed Salvationists over the age of 55 with experience of playing in Corps bands.
Many members still play in Corps bands whilst others have retired from corps duties. It provides the opportunity for members of small corps bands to play music that cannot be tackled by their own corps band.
Leadership
The band′s first bandmaster was Ken Kew, the retired bandmaster at Reading Central and he trained and conducted the band for three years until he handed the baton to his deputy, Brian Cooper from Maidenhead. After a number of years leading the band, Brian was succeeded by Ken Clark, who is the present bandmaster.
Uniform
Members come from so many corps with differing styles of uniform and the decision was made to make the appearance more uniform. Hence, red jackets and specially designed epaulets were purchased.
Rehearsals
Rehearsals take place on the first and third Mondays of each month. Initially these were at Reading West corps but, when extensive building work started at that corps, the venue was moved to Reading Central and then later to The Reading Lower Earley corps.
The Ladies Chorus
The founding members of the band were all men and none of them had a wife with any banding experience, being from a generation when women did not play brass instruments. However, the wives wanted to be involved and in the spring of 2000 the ladies formed a singing group. They are led by Karen Todd. The chorus meets for rehearsal at the same time as the band and it performs in many of the band′s concerts.