Grimethorpe Colliery Band to perform sell-out gig at National Coal Mining Museum

• Video report by Jonathan Brown

One of the world's most famous brass bands will perform a sell-out gig at the National Coal Mining Museum in Wakefield.

The Grimethorpe Colliery Band will perform at the former Caphouse Colliery on Saturday.

Cornet player Scott Walker, the son of a former miner, said: "It's fantastic. It's the best concert hall in the world.

"It sends a chill down your spine. I think I probably would have followed him into the mining industry, but unfortunately, when I started work, all the collieries had closed.

"The noise and the dust and the smells and the heat and the things like that. It must have been. Yeah. Yeah. Very difficult job."

The band was established 107 years ago as an outlet for workers at the South Yorkshire pit and has since become known the world over.The 1996 film Brassed Off was inspired by its triumph against adversity.

'Very special'

The band has performed at some of the world's biggest events, including football's World Cup, the BAFTA Awards, BBC Proms, Eurovision and the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Saturday's gig was organised to mark 40 years since the miners' strikes of 1984-5.

Horn player Helen Varley said: "It's really something - the sound as we came down, the lift as we were coming down. You could hear the players at the bottom already and it was sort of echoing right the way through the chambers is really something else.

"It's a real privilege to be part of an event like this."

Dr John Tanner, from the museum, added: "It's a very important time for us as a country and as cultural communities looking back at those challenging times.

"But everything else that the coal industry meant as well. And to be able to do that with Grimethorpe as the world's most famous colliery band is very special indeed for us."