Author: Olivia Swift

If you’re new to brass band music, set aside any previous preconceptions – oh yes, there will always be the covers of our favourite film soundtracks or the Theme from ‘Shaft’ if you’re lucky – and hopefully bands playing in local markets forevermore, however, there is something about this world of sound that is incredibly addictive. 

Over 10 weeks, musician Hannah Peel plays the finest brass band music from the most loved pieces to the newest compositions, fresh off the page. Passionate, talented and competitive; Brass banding is a uniquely rich and rewarding community. 

Working with the presenter Hannah Peel has been a dream. Hannah is perhaps best known for her gorgeous ambient synth music and scores for TV and film. But her musical journey started when she moved from Northern Ireland to Barnsley in Yorkshire at age 8. There she was handed a trombone and welcomed into a musical community where she learnt to perform, to read music and to work together as a team to achieve great things. 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by BBC Radio 3 (@bbcradio3)

In researching this programme we discovered that brass banding, which formed in the 19th Century during  Britain’s Industrial Age, has spread across the globe. Each episode Hannah drops a pin into a different location on our ‘Map of Banding’, exploring some of the lesser known locations where banding is thriving like Norway, Switzerland, USA and Japan. 

And we couldn’t make a brass band series without hearing from the community themselves. So in each episode we drop into a band room to invite players, conductors, band leaders and the community to tell us what they do and recommend a piece.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Reform Radio (@reformradio)

Broadcast from 27th April to 29th June 2025

Listen on BBC Sound, each episode is available for 30 days after broadcast.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002b65z

We Are Survivors is a survivor focused organisation that provides safe spaces for male (including trans and non-binary individuals) survivors of sexual abuse, rape and sexual exploitation across Greater Manchester.

They teamed up with Rope Ladder Fiction, a Manchester-based drama production company. Together they created a series of powerful written pieces, using the survivors’ personal experiences to create four moving stories of hope and resilience. 

Rope Ladder approached Reform Radio to produce the recording of the stories. Read and performed by Neil Bell, our team directed the performance. We encouraged the writers to be in the room during the recording of their pieces, ensuring they felt a part of the process and experienced how it all worked. 

Our team then edited each piece, adding in detailed sound design to bring the stories to life. We received amazing feedback from both the Rope Ladder Fiction team, and the writers.

Joseph from Rope Ladder Fiction said: “Working on these audio dramas with We Are Survivors has been a privilege that has led to four emotive and well-written pieces of storytelling being created. We can’t thank Reform Radio enough for their professional and comforting approach to producing these audio dramas and inviting us into their space. From February to July, this creative process is one that has been allowed time and care. Olivia and the rest of the team respected this from the get-go and matched this ethos during the two recording days.”

Tonies is a children’s toy maker, bringing listening and playing together. The Toniebox uses audio storytelling to introduce pre-readers and developing readers to the wonders of narrative long before children can read the words in a book. 

Children and parents can listen to narrators like Rupert Grint, Denzel Washington, Morgan Freeman, Whoopi Goldberg, David Walliams, and Jodie Whitaker reading stories like The Emperor’s New Clothes, Peter and the Wolf, and The Very Hungry Caterpillar. 

We worked with Tonies on their series of short children’s stories, written by the author Rachel Bright and narrated by actor Bill Nighy. The stories followed the adventures of a curious Koala, a lonely Gecko, and a nervous Lion. Our team wrote, recorded, and edited the introductions to each story as well as the quiz and outro that followed each tale. Our brilliant in-house team worked hard to ensure the audio was engaging, exciting, and was appropriate for the target audience of 3-8 year olds.

Hosted by creative force Mia Thornton, Instrumental is a 5 episode music podcast celebrating the powerful yet often overlooked contributions of Black British artists in shaping Britain’s most cherished musical genres – those not as typically associated with Black culture, such as classical, punk, folk, dance and pop. 

Through captivating storytelling, expert interviews with high profile contributors such as Craig David and Clara Amfo, and rich archival content, each episode focuses on one of these genres, touching themes of erasure and re-telling, breaking stereotypes, legal and economic challenges and safe spaces and community to name a few.  

This is a BBC Sounds podcast produced under the Audio Lab 2024 scheme, a training and development programme helping to amplify the next-generation of podcast producers and audio creatives, set for release in early 2025.

It is the first podcast for the BBC that makes use of a new music rights agreement called SORP, meaning we’re able to feature longer music extracts than the usual BBC documentaries you hear!

Find more information on the BBC Sounds Audio Lab Scheme here.

The BBC Indie Development Fund is awarded to six independent production companies and gives them a financial grant plus mentoring support. The aim is to help small production companies develop their work which in turn allows the BBC to better represent, serve and reflect all audiences. 

Reform has been partnered with and is being mentored by Radio 3, the home of classical music on the BBC and we have worked across three areas with the fund. 

1. Classical Connections Open Forum

We wanted to explore the barriers people face when connecting with classical music in an Open Forum discussion. Classical composer Afrodeutsche hosted a discussion to understand why people struggle to connect with classical music, and how that might affect who works in classical music radio. 

2. A two-day workshop: How to be a classical music radio producer 

We provided training in the skills required for music radio production skills and an understanding of the current landscape of classical music radio. Participants developed ideas for a new radio/podcast series and recorded a short trailer for their ideas. 

3. Hiring a junior producer

Welcome to Tylah Pierce who took part in both the Open Forum and the two day workshop! Tylah joins us on a 6-month contract in our podcasting team and is eagerly helping out across our projects, gaining hands-on industry experience in radio and podcasting production. 

Manchester International Festival has invited some of the greatest artists on the planet to delight and often challenge crowds in spaces of all shapes and sizes – from car parks to concert halls. They have crossed boundaries, leapt over them, broken through them.

Ahead of 2024’s festival events, we created two in depth programmes looking at two of their projects; Balmy Army and Factory Sounds.

When the Co-Op Foundation came to us looking to make a short series podcast to promote their new cooperative strategy. Working closely with a group of young people, they developed a vision for how organisations can run in the future.

We helped them to bring together a range of experts and young people to discuss their process, outcomes, and obstacles. The result was a three part series showcasing the achievements of the strategy.

Listen to the series here.

We have been producing the award-winning Kaplan’s Learn Better Podcast since the start of 2021. The podcast is made for those currently studying or about to study professional accountancy qualifications.

From wellbeing to industry related topics, host Stuart Pedley Smith interviews key industry players and current students to discover more about the current work/training landscape.

Previous guests have discussed the importance of diversity in finance, the global opportunities accountancy can bring, and how Artificial Intelligence will transform the industry.

Kaplan’s Learn Better Podcast won Podcast of the Year at the PQ Magazine Awards in 2022 and 2024.

If you head to the reopened Manchester Museum and find the South Asian Gallery, you will hear an aural exhibit produced by Reform Radio. The first gallery in the UK dedicated to the stories of the South Asian diaspora, the exhibit features stories from the South Asian LGBTQ+ community, which were recorded and put together by Reform.

Reform Radio produced BBC Sounds weekly mix series Focus Beats from October 2022 until the brand was rested in April 2024. Doing exactly what it says on the tin, Focus Beats is a curated mix of beats and instrumental tracks designed to help you concentrate. Whether you’re working, studying, or focusing on a hobby, this is your soundtrack.

Every few weeks the mix was curated by a very special guest, organised and produced by our team. These guest curators included musicians, producers, and productivity influencers, all with the aim of bringing the brand to a wider audience.

You can hear mixes from the likes of influencers Grace Beverley and Ali Abdaal, and musicians Moonchild, ELIZA, Surprise Chef, and Sampa the Great.

Check out previous shows here.

Bespoke video content

The BBC Sounds team also commissioned us to make bespoke video content for the Focus Beats series, created by our in-house content team. This included a video tied into the BBC’s 50 years of Hip-Hop celebrations, in which our team took to the streets of Manchester. They challenged local passers by to listen to iconic hip-hop instrumentals and guess the artist. This was a perfect example of how we are always injecting fun and creativity into our productions.

@bbc6music

How many of these hip hop instrumentals do you know? 🎧 We put the people of Manchester to the test! As part of our celebration of 50 years since the birth of hip hop, you can listen to special episodes of Focus Beats with instrumentals to help you stay in the zone 🙇 #hiphopbeats #hiphopinstrumental #guessthesong #manchester

♬ original sound – BBC Radio 6 Music

@reformradio

Can’t Focus? Tune into Focus Beats now & drown out that noise. 😇 Listen on BBC Sounds on demand! 💖 #bbcsounds

♬ original sound – Reform Radio

When Manchester’s first city centre park in over a century opened its gates, we teamed up with the National Lottery Heritage Fund to explore the past, present and future of the site.

In this three part series we delved into the rich history of Mayfield Park, looking at The River, The Green Space, and The Culture of this area. Featuring archival audio from Manchester’s Central Library archive, this series features guests like author Robert Graham and Hacienda legend DJ Paulette.

The whole series was produced by young producer Jamie Green, who joined Reform on a Kickstart placement, with on site audio recordings, vox pops and interviews conducted by a group of Manchester Adult Education Service participants.

Read more about Jamie’s journey here. The podcast itself hopes to have its own legacy within the site, with QR codes to be placed on windows, allowing visitors to listen to episodes whilst immersing themselves in the park. Listen now.