A documentary on TV recently showed that after making 'Brassed Off', Pete Postlethwaite maintained his link with Grimethorpe Colliery Band to the extent that he occasionally did a 'guest spot' conducting the band. For some reason that really touched me.

As for the miners' strike, our household had very mixed feelings. Dad was a lifelong union man, a shop steward who worked on the canals hauling coal from the pits to the ports for export. When the miners went on long-term strike, dad's work came to an abrupt end and he was laid off without pay. Not being a miner, he didn't get any strike pay either. He sympathised with the miners but was a powerless victim of their strike.

Anyway, I'd fully agree that in those pit villages brass bands were a kind of folk process; men whose education and economic background were often limited nevertheless learned to read music and play instruments in real contrast to their daily working conditions.