On the Friday after Whit Sunday, brass bands from across the country head for the villages of Saddleworth and Tameside, on the edge of the Pennines, for the Whit Friday march contests. It is one of the great days in the brass band calendar, and Backworth Colliery Band has long been part of it.
How Whit Friday works
Each village holds its own contest. Bands travel from one to the next through the evening, and at each stop they march along the road playing a march of their choice for an adjudicator listening out of sight. A band can play at several contests in a single evening, with the results announced at the end of the night.
It makes for a long, demanding and memorable day: a trip across the Pennines, an evening of marching and playing, and the chance to hear dozens of other bands at close quarters.
Backworth on Whit Friday
The band’s archive lists Whit Friday among its regular engagements from the late twentieth century, alongside the Durham Miners’ Gala and regional contests. In recent years the band made the trip in 2014, 2015 and 2017, in 2023 and 2024, and again on 29 May 2026, when its contests included Uppermill.
Next year’s Whit Friday falls on 21 May 2027, and it is already in the band’s diary.
Photographs from past Whit Fridays are in our gallery.