After a successful first event held last year, the streets of Laxey will once again come alive to the sounds of brass band music.

The second Great Laxey Brass Band festival, or the Prash Laxaa, as it is better known, takes place this Sunday afternoon, from 1.30pm.

The Prash Laxaa is a celebration of brass band music, and especially the brass band scene on the island, and will see five of the island’s bands take part, making their way through the town and performing at several different locations throughout the afternoon before they all join together.

The brass groups the Castletown Metropolitan Silver Band, the Douglas Town Band, the Manx Concert Brass and Youth Band, the Ramsey Town Band, and the Rushen Silver Band will all take part.

They will each be appearing between five different venues, such as the Laxey Glen Pavilion, the Bridge Inn, the Mines Tavern and the Queens Hotel along with the village square.

There are three performance times of between 1.30pm and 2pm, 2.20pm to 2.50 and 3.10pm to 3.40pm, with each group performing three tunes at their venue.

The bands will all converge on the village square for a final, climactic, joint performance together at 4pm.

The free event was first held last year, and featured just three bands.

The prospect of enjoying brass music in the sun drew hundreds of people to Laxey and made the inaugural festival a great success.

Organiser Martin Royle said that they intended to start the festival small and let it grow organically.

’Last year was a great success, and it was always the idea that we would expand from three bands to five this year,’ said Martin.

’In the future, it would be great to see if we could invite a guest band from across to take part, but we are so fortunate that we have a lot of very talented local bands.’

’But we do want to keep the feel of the festival as a nice day out in the sun for people. It’s a chance to spend an afternoon in Laxey sampling some great music and the great range of refreshments available at the numerous café and public house locations.’

The festival is planned as an outdoor event, but the organisers have a wet weather contingency, details of which will be published, along with a full running order, on the Garff Commissioners’ Facebook page.