In 1846, a Spanish monk named Salvado arrived in Western Australia. He walked into the wilderness and, 200 km north-east of Perth, established a monastery at New Norcia. And what’s the connection with Mountains Youth Band?

Local violinist and music historian, Jon Rose has been researching the history of the music of New Norcia for a BBC radio documentary. The monk Salvado was a musician and composer. There were Aboriginal people living at the monastery in the 1800s and Salvado wrote music and taught a group of young people to play brass instruments.

Through his research, Jon Rose discovered some music composed by Salvado in the 1800s for the youth Aboriginal brass ensemble. One dance piece, The Shearing Polka, was written in about 1880 and there is no known recording of a brass ensemble playing the piece. Jon was keen to find a youth brass band who could play it so it could be recorded for the BBC documentary.

After reading in the local paper about Mountains Youth Band’s win at the National Championships, Jon realised he may have found a youth band to play The Shearing Polka! He contacted us and Daniel Johnson took up the project. Daniel transcribed the original handwritten scores, organised a group of brass instrumentalists and percussionists to get together, learn the music and record the piece.

Jon was delighted with the outcome and with the enthusiasm and talent of our Mountains Youth Band instrumentalists. He told the group that they’d made history that morning. The piece is an important example of early Australian music and an important part of our heritage.

Thanks to the ten instrumentalists involved - Daniel Johnson [who organised the project], Alexander Clarke, Tim Coggins, Hannah Morris, Owen Morris, Owen Robinson, Jonathan Sharoff, Dan Wallis, Tyler Wilkinson and Thomas Zierholz.