Concert Review
Prince Bishops Brass – 17th November 2025
A welcome return to Penrith Music Club of Prince Bishops Brass ensemble brought considerable good cheer
on a cold November night, in Penrith Methodist Church.
A most entertaining and accomplished performance
The members of Prince Bishops’ Brass’ repartee belied their supreme musical skill and talent, their programme ranging from antiphonal Venetian church music by Gabrieli, through Jeremiah Clarke’s Suite, essentially dance band music of Seventeenth century England, to Bramwell Tovey’s brash and jazzy American West coast Santa Barbara Suite. Points in between were a well-crafted and played arrangement of a typically intricate fugue by Bach, Victor Ewald’s ground-breaking 19th century brass quintet based on Russian folk themes, Paul Dukas’ fairy tale and dreamy Fanfare, Copland’s Buckaroo Holiday (again a well-crafted arrangement brought off with suitable panache) and four episodes, or songs, from Bernstein’s West Side Story.
As well as the broad range, which reflects to some degree the technical development of brass instruments over the centuries, these pieces allowed us to hear their exceptional individual playing and the balance of the ensemble. The second half of the programme, modern and more jazzy, also showed why that precise, classical if you will, style of playing brings a crisp energy to such music.
Interspersed with the music, the players introduced themselves and their instruments, as well as many interesting asides on the music they were playing.
They gave the audience a most entertaining and accomplished evening’s performance of a wide range of excellent music – and in that I include their encore, a spirited rendition of ‘I ain’t never seen a elephant fly!’
Charles Ritchie