A recent article by the highly respected Guardian newspaper sports journalist David Conn has revealed that the 24 clubs in the Football League Championship lost £349 million according to their last set of published accounts, and have a combined debt of £947 million.

Current state

So what is the current state of affairs at the top ranked British brass bands in this era of financial austerity, concert fee cut backs and contest payouts that on the whole haven’t kept pace with even the rise in inflation.

4BR has been trawling through the available public documents. 11 of the top 12 4BR/World of Brass ranked bands in the UK have registered their accounts through the Charities Commission or Office, the Scottish Charity Regulator or Companies House.

Profit and loss

On their latest submissions they show a combined income of £1,140,330, with expenditure running at £1,144,745.

Six bands announced a combined profit amounting to over £38,000 — the highest over £16,000, the lowest just under £200.

Five bands announced a combined loss amounting to £42,400 — the highest over £15,000, the lowest just over £2,600. Three bands account for over £36,500 of those losses.

Some anomalies

It must be noted that some accounting procedures do differ and there are some anomalies in the figures — with subsidiaries, insurance claims, cash balances, grants etc taken into account. However, the figures are those published by the bands.

We could not find information on five UK bands ranked in the top 30, with one band only recently gaining charitable status.

On their latest submissions they show a combined income of £1,140,330, with expenditure running at £1,144,7454BR

Next nine

Of the next nine UK bands in the top 40 rankings, the total income amounted to £376,275 with expenditure of £374,870.

Three announced a combined profit amounting to just under £11,000 — the highest over £5,200, the lowest just under £3,000.

Five announced a combined loss amounting to just over £9,000 — the highest over £4,000, the lowest just over £200.

One band’s books were balanced.