Editor Kenneth Crookston Publisher KGC Media Ltd. Country United Kingdom | Frequency Monthly First issue September 1887 | |
Categories British brass band music | ||
British Bandsman is a magazine published monthly in West Lothian devoted to British brass band music. It was founded in 1887 by Sam Cope (1856-1948) and acquired by The Salvation Army in 2004, before being sold in April 2015 to KGC Media Ltd., a company formed by the publication's current Managing Editor In August 2014, it was confirmed by Guinness World Records as the world's oldest weekly music magazine.
British Bandsman first appeared in September 1887 as The British Bandsman: A monthly magazine for Bandmasters and members of Military and Brass Bands. The magazine was printed monthly until circulation increased to weekly in 1902 after John Henry Iles purchased the publishing company Richard Smith & Co.
Production ceased for two weeks during the 1926 United Kingdom general strike in May 1926, and other than four editions that never appeared during Christmas closures in the 1970s, plus a period from September 1975 to September 1976 when it was published fortnightly, the magazine appeared weekly until 1 October 2016, when it was announced that it was to become a monthly publication. Edition 5948 was published on 3 December 2016 and at that time a total of 6,122 editions had been published since 1887.