How a Northern Quarter music venue was crucial in the reinterpretation of 19th-century Broadside Ballads

Band on the Wall is a music venue with a unique past, and the kind of venue that acts as a hub for various communities and cultural movements, becoming in itself ‘a transient product of the activities of remembering and reminiscing, which take place in the context of social interaction… between people and their environments’ (Jones and Russell 2012: 270). Located in an area long associated with a dissenting tradition reflected in notable musical, political and artistic events, the venue is part of a wider cultural landscape that has developed a unique sense of place through the various social networks using the building for decades, and is therefore key to the influence of, and on, the communities involved. This chapter will discuss the cultural heritage manifest in music venues, focusing on Band on the Wall and the activities taking place within, as represented by the recent Manchester’s Improving Daily project.