Run the band,not the admin.

One home for rehearsals, contests and the community around them — availability, chat, practice and who’s actually covering the front row on the night.

Start your band freeSee how it works
No spreadsheets · no group-chat chaos · your whole band in one place
No install neededUse it in your browser
A player’s practice tracker in BandHQ, with their instrument and the week logged.
The BandHQ home screen, showing the next rehearsal and live section balance.
Beyond availability

Availability apps stop at who’s coming. A brass band needs to know it’s covered, connected and contest-ready.

One app, the whole night

Everything the band lives on, between rehearsals.

The Autumn Contest in BandHQ, with a coverage bar for every section.The band’s General channel in BandHQ, mid-conversation.A player’s practice tracker in BandHQ, showing the week and the band challenge.
01 · Section balance

Know the front row is covered — before the night, not on it.

Set the strength you want in each section. As players reply, live coverage bars show exactly where you're thin and who to call.

  • Healthy, nearly, or needs-subs — at a glance.
  • Flag an empty chair; members claim "I'll cover".
  • Nudge whoever hasn't replied, in one tap.
02 · Band chat & news

Keep the band talking in one place — not five group chats.

Channels for the whole band or just your section, with reactions, photos and announcements. Everyone's in; no one's left off the thread.

  • Real-time channels, reactions and attachments.
  • Announcements with comments and reactions.
  • Report or block from any message, without leaving the thread.
03 · Practice tracker

Turn "did you practise?" into something the band can see.

Members log sessions against their own targets, and the whole band can chase a shared goal together. Private by default, motivating by design.

  • Weekly goals, streaks and a band challenge.
  • Log the instrument, the time, the piece.
  • Gentle nudges — never a leaderboard you didn't want.

"The first thing that actually understands how a brass band works— sections, deps, contests and all."

— Design partner, 50 years playing in brass bands

Everything the committee juggles

One place for the whole operation.

Section balance

The differentiator. Live coverage per section so you can see the night take shape and act before there’s a hole in the sound.

Cornets
Euphs
Basses

Events & availability

Rehearsals, concerts and contests on a month calendar, with Yes / No / Maybe from every player.

Roster, sections & positions

Every player, instrument and section — plus committee positions like Musical Director, Librarian and Secretary. Each profile shows how reliably they reply and turn up.

Dep requests

Empty chair? Flag it; members or deps step in to cover.

Reminders that send themselves

A daily job chases whoever hasn’t replied to the next event, and nudges practice once a week — in the app and by email.

Bandroom chat & DMs

Channels for the whole band and quieter ones for each section, plus one-to-one messages between adults — under the same safeguarding limits as the rest of the app.

News & the band community

Announcements with photos, reactions and comments — so the things that matter stop getting lost between three different group chats.

Attendance register

Take the register on the night, against who said they were coming. Each player sees their own record — and nobody else’s.

Practice & readiness

Weekly goals, streaks and a band-wide challenge before the contest. Private by default, and locked private for under-18s.

Calendar subscription

Every player gets a private link that drops the band’s rehearsals and engagements straight into Apple Calendar, Google Calendar or Outlook — no fresh app to check.

Committee-only meetings

A meeting the committee needs is not a rehearsal the band should see. Committee events are hidden from ordinary members at the database, not in the interface — along with the notifications, the calendar entry and the RSVP chase.

Safeguarding, built in

Age checks, linked guardians, moderation and private-message limits — on by default, not a paid add-on. See how it works.

Safeguarding

Young players, looked after
by design.

A band is one of the few places where 11-year-olds and 70-year-olds share a room. BandHQ is built for that — protections on from the first day, for every band, at no cost.

  • Date of birth at sign-up. Under-13s can’t self-register — a band admin adds them with a parent or guardian.
  • A guardian gets their own login and manages the young players in their care.
  • Adults and under-18s can never open a private chat. It’s enforced in the database, not by a setting an admin can switch off.
  • Every message is screened before it’s stored, against a shared list of prohibited words and website addresses. Committees can add their own.
  • Report or block from any message, and admins get a review queue rather than a silent deletion.
How safeguarding works
A guardian’s home in BandHQ, listing the two children in their care.
From bandroom to contest stage

Every rehearsal, every dep, every contest —
one home for the whole band.

0
Brass sections tracked out of the box
0
App for the whole band, not five tools
0
Spreadsheets and lost WhatsApp threads
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Of the band, in one shared home
Fair on a band’s budget

Free for your band. Paid only for what comes next.

The app is free, and stays free. Plus is one flat price per band for the committee tools we build next — never per player.

Free forever
Free
The whole app, for every band.
£0
Forever · every player included
  • Roster, player profiles & sections
  • Events, availability & section balance
  • Dep requests & reminders that send themselves
  • Practice tracking, goals & band challenges — free forever
  • Rehearsal attendance register
  • Band chat, news & notifications
  • Full safeguarding — age checks, guardians, moderation
Start your band
Coming soon
Plus
For the committee and the band room, once it lands.
One price per band
However many players — never per head
  • Everything in Free, always
  • MD analytics — attendance & section health over time
  • Rehearsal passages — set the work down to the bar, and see who’s still red on it
  • Committee — meetings, minutes, actions, trustees, renewals & a handover pack
  • Programmes — a concert running order, shared with the band and printed
  • Contest & concert seating — a name on every chair, and a crew sheet
  • Safeguarding officer & DBS register — after its legal review
  • Handbook & policies hub — this season
Join the waitlist

Join the waitlist and we’ll tell you the price before anyone else — along with a founder rate for the bands who backed us early.

Before you ask

The questions committees ask first.

Short answers, and the honest version rather than the flattering one. Anything else, email us — a person replies.

Is it really free?

Yes — the whole app, for every player in your band, with no time limit and no card. Not a trial, and not a cut-down tier: availability, section balance, dep requests, practice tracking, chat, the attendance register and the full safeguarding stack are all in the free band.

Plusis the paid thing that comes later. Most of it is for the committee — MD analytics, meetings and minutes, concert programmes and contest seating, with a DBS register once its legal review clears and a handbook and policy hub this season — but one part is for the players: rehearsal passages, where the MD sets the work down to the bar and everyone logs how they’re getting on with it, so the band knows where it stands before the next rehearsal rather than after it.

Practice tracking itself stays free — the goals, the streaks, the band challenges, all of it. Plus adds a layer on top; it takes nothing away. When it lands it will be one price per band, however many players you have. Never per head, because a band that recruits a junior section should not get a bigger bill for it.

Is it safe for young players?

A band is one of the few places an 11-year-old and a 70-year-old share a room every week, and BandHQ is built for that rather than adapted to it. The protections are on from the first day, for every band, at no cost — there is no safeguarding upgrade.

Members under 13 are added with a parent or guardian, who accepts on their behalf and gets their own view. Under-18s get private-by-default profiles. Messages and images are moderated, and anyone can report or block. An adult cannot open a private message with a child: that one is enforced in the database itself, so no band setting can switch it off by accident.

The detail, including what it does not do, is on the safeguarding page.

We run on spreadsheets and WhatsApp. How do we move?

You don’t, really — you start with the next rehearsal. Create the band and the 18 brass sections are already there, along with a general channel. Add the players you want and send them a link; they set their own password, fill in their own instrument and take it from there.

There is no spreadsheet import, and honestly there does not need to be: typing in a roster is an evening’s job once, and everything after it — who is available, who is covering the front row, who has actually read the message — is the part the spreadsheet was never going to do. Put one rehearsal in and see whether the replies come back faster.

Ready when you are

Get the band in tune
off the stand, too.

Set up your band in minutes. Invite the players, plan the next contest, and never chase a reply on WhatsApp again.

Start your band freeExplore the features