Our Story
The original band, called The Versatile Concert Orchestra, was formed by Geoff Seals in September 1982. Geoff was a very competent musician who conducted the Crewe Coop Band in the seventies. He approached the quartet that Frank and David Stubbs were playing in, to be the nucleus of his big band project that comprised David and Frank Stubbs, tenor sax /clarinet and double bass, Les Robinson keyboards and vibraphone and John Bibby, percussion.
Geoff had many brass and reed players that he could call upon and so formed a band of initially some 15 members. He had the idea of forming a concert orchestra which was to play bigband swing and specialise in Latin American music, hence the name - The Versatile Concert Orchestra.
The inaugural rehearsal was held at the Fox Pub in Haslington in the spring of 1983. Frank Stubbs was initially the main singer and also played double bass. Over the years the band has had many good singers. We tried to have about five gigs per year and have rehearsed in a few venues in Crewe.
Geoff retired from the band (as he had moved to Leeds and commuting was becoming unsustainable). In 2015 Glyn Brown- Evans took over and the band’s name was changed to ‘The Cheshire 20 Big Band’. Glyn was the band's Musical Director until 2019 when he emigrated and the band, after a short while, was very fortunate to be able to attract our current Musical Director –Vince Galley.
The number 20 comes from the fact that the band has around 20 regular members.