Fairey Band

The Fairey Band is a brass band based in Heaton Chapel in Stockport, Greater Manchester. The band has achieved fame in modern music circles with its appearances playing Acid Brass although they still play traditional brass band music and participate each year in the Whit Friday Brass Band contests.

Its name comes from Sir Richard Fairey and the Fairey Aviation Company, famous in later years for the Fairey Delta 2 aircraft – the first aircraft in level flight to exceed 1,000 mph, and had an important contribution to the shape of Concorde and its drooped nose. An early signature tune for the band was Beaufighters, after a fighter aircraft Bristol Beaufighter made at Fairey in Heaton Chapel (and elsewhere) for "Ministry of Aircraft Production".

Fairey Aviation

The band was formed in 1937 as the Fairey Aviation Works Band by workers at the aircraft factory. This was at a time when the company was producing aircraft that would see plenty of action in the first few weeks of World War II, although sadly few of its aircraft would be of sufficient calibre to pose a real threat to German aircraft. Its aircraft, especially the old-fashioned yet versatile and destructive Fairey Swordfish, mainly carried torpedoes for the Fleet Air Arm. Fairey were taken over by Westland Aircraft of Yeovil, chiefly due to its innovative Fairey Rotodyne. The band's name was shortened to the Fairey Band in the 1960s and changed to the Fairey Engineering Works Band in the late 1970s.

Sponsorship

The band became known as the Williams Fairey Engineering Band when Fairey Engineering Ltd was taken over by Williams Holdings in 1986.