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Basses

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Dave Howard
Principal Eb Bass

Vice Chairman

A fourth generation “brass bander”, Dave started playing cornet with Cwmbran Band In South Wales at the tender age of 6, progressing to become principal cornet and then solo euphonium. He also held the position of principal baritone in the National Youth Brass Band of Great Britain.  After leaving school he began working at the BBC and took a sabbatical from playing to spend more time with his young family. During this time he devised and ran the Welsh Brewers Brass Band Entertainment Contest, produced “Sounding Brass” and resurrected the “Radio Wales Brass Band of the Year Competition”.  When Dave’s children started playing, he took them to the “Radyr and Morganstown Brass Band” where he also started playing again and joined the committee.  While chairman of the band, he instigated the change of name to “City of Cardiff (Melingriffith)”, the formation of a second band (M2) and a youth band (M3). Dave’s keen interest in the history of the band, and the music of the band’s most famous conductor, T.J. Powell, led to him restoring many of the works the “Welsh Sousa” wrote for the band so they could be performed again. Dave has had a connection with TSB since 2015 (through his daugher Fiona) and has been a valuable Euphonium 'dep' on numerous occasions. Following a relocation to Towcester in 2021, Dave has now moved to the 'dark side' and is playing Eb Bass.

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Carolyn Stoneman
Eb Bass

Committee Member

Carolyn started playing cornet in Wolverton Town Band when she was 9 years old. She comes from a long family tradition of brass bands, with parents, grandparents and siblings all playing brass instruments. Her grandfather conducted Newport Pagnell Town Band in the 50's and 60's, so brass banding has always featured heavily in her life. She joined Brosely Brass (now MK Brass) in 1990, playing Tenor Horn, Baritone and most recently Euphonium. She helped out TSB at Christmas 2012, before becoming a regular member after the Area contest. In February 2017 Carolyn moved to the dark side just before the Area contest.

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Ashley Lowe
Principal Bb Bass

Ashley joined the band in 2008. He started his brass playing at the age of 9 under Adele Sellers (now Hudson) on euphonium. One day his mum dropped him off at school with a euphonium and when she picked him up she had to rearrange the car (90s Ford Fiesta) as he came out with a Eflat tuba as Adele Hudson wanted a tuba for her school band. He never looked back and continued lessons into secondary school and joined the brass band, concert band and jazz band until he left school in 2011. He continue playing with TSB until 2017 when he had 2 years off due to ill health and rejoined the band in November 2019 and helped on percussion for Butlins contest 2020 (he's definitely sticking to tuba) ask anyone about him and tubular bells it's a good laugh. He now is principal B-flat in the band and also second man down in the Caravan and Motorhome Club Concert Band. If you wanted to know or just even feel the weight of the tuba, find him at any gig and he will let you have a hold and see if you can reach the forth valve unlike his wife, Heather (see percussion)

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Andrew Holman

Bb Bass

Andrew started playing Trumpet when he went to secondary school at the age of 11, taught by peripatetic brass teacher Mr Blake who played in the Hanwell Band. When his brother had started learning 2 years earlier his parents bought him a nice new shiny brass B&M Champion Trumpet. They refused to buy Andrew one on the grounds that he would “not stick with it”, so he joined his local brass band and came home with a frosted silver Regent Cornet. Captain Ray Munn coached the new recruits and Andrew gradually edged along the back row. 7 years later he had saved enough money to buy his own new shiny silver round stamp 928 Sovereign and he sat on the front row closest to the conductor. Andrew’s brass banding days were interrupted by college, marriage, a 20 year jazz sabbatical playing Trumpet (a 1967 Olds Super, not the Champion) in the “Kingy Big Band”, a stint on Saxophone, then orchestral French Horn before eventually arriving at TSB on BBb Bass at the start of 2024. Although mostly ‘self-taught’ during lock down, Andrew is grateful to all the other local brass bands who aided his circuitous tuba route to Towcester. And that old Champion? It went into hibernation not long after the Regent’s arrival reappearing nearly 4 decades later when Uncle Andrew taught his nephew to play. It had its final swan song on a well-known auction site when he upgraded to a shiny new (to him) Sovereign

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