| Biography | The Band of the Coldstream Guards is one of the oldest and best known bands in the British Army, having been officially formed on 16 May 1785 under the command of Major C F Eley, reflecting the fact that the Coldstream Guards regiment is the oldest of the guards regiments. Although the band is not technically the oldest in the Army, it has the longest standing tradition of music, as from its earliest days the officers of the Coldstream Guards hired eight musicians to provide music for the regiment during the changing of the guard. This is an event which still occurs today, every day at eleven thirty in the summer outside Buckingham Palace.
The band received the first British bandmaster in 1835 called Charles Godfry, as previously most bandmasters had been foreign, such as the first who was German.
The Coldstream Guards Band was one of the very first British army bands to make a recording before World War I.
On 18 June 1944 over one hundred twenty people were killed in the chapel at Wellington Barracks when a German flying bomb hit the chapel. The director of the band was included in those killed, prompting Captain Douglas Alexander Pope to be appointed.
In 1960, the band started a new tradition, to tour from coast to coast of the United States of America and Canada. This tradition still takes place.
In 1985, during the band's two hundredth anniversary year, the Coldstream Guards kicked off the Live Aid conecrt at Wembley Stadium, performing "God Save The Queen"
The band is currently based at Wellington Barracks in St. James's London along with all of the other guards bands. |