RAFA Cranwell Bomber County Charity Concert 2024

The RAFA Cranwell Branch Bomber County Charity Concert Sunday 12 May 2024, 7pm to 10pm.

RAFA The Charity That Supports The RAF Family

The annual RAFA Cranwell Branch Bomber County Charity Concert is held to raise funds for the Royal Air Forces Association Wings Appeal Charity (Charity Number 226686).

This charity provides help and support to serving and veterans of the RAF and Air Forces of the Commonwealth, their spouses and dependants. This is achieved by providing welfare visits, emergency financial grants and funding, respite care, long term care for the elderly, sheltered accommodation, holiday chalets and caravans.

The RAFA also works very closely with other military charities, this includes the RAF Benevolent Fund, the Royal British Legion, SSAFA and others. Last year the concert raised £1004.74.

The concert is on Sunday 12 May 2024, at the Masonic Rooms, Watergate Sleaford, at 7pm, doors open at 6.30pm. Tickets cost £10 each and are available from 1 April, at Moore & Scrupps Jewellers and Sleaford Jewellers, both of Southgate Sleaford; in addition, they will be available in the foyer of Tesco Superstore Sleaford, from 10am until 4pm on Thursday 9 May, also on the door of the Masonic Rooms, from 6.30pm on the evening of the concert.

There will be a licensed bar, available throughout the concert, selling beers, wines, spirits and soft drinks. We will as usual be holding a raffle of prizes donated by local shops and businesses, a full list of our donators and supporters will be published in the free concert programme, this will be available on entry to the concert.

Nuremberg Raid March 1944

This annual charity concert is also dedicated to the brave airmen of Bomber Command who took part in the disastrous Nuremberg Raid on the night of 30/31 March 1944 and especially the 545 airmen who lost their lives on this single night’s raid. This horrendous loss of lives, in Bomber Command, on a single night’s raid, was higher than in Fighter Command, during the whole of the Battle of Britain. No official memorial exists for those brave airmen that took part in this infamous air raid.

D-Day Landings 80th Anniversary

This year we also celebrate the 80th Anniversary of the D-Day Landings, on 6 June 1944. Bomber Command supported the Allied Forces’ Landings before, during and after the landings. Due to poor weather conditions, many of the bombing was inaccurate and unsuccessful. However, the destruction of the German E-Boat Motor Torpedo Fleet, based at Le Havre and Boulogne, was a great success.

The German E-Boats were a significant threat to the D-Day Landing Force vessels, being larger and faster, with speeds up to 40 Knots, than the Allied forces equivalent vessels. These E-Boat bases were protected by reinforced concrete type bunkers, with roofs up to 8 feet thick. The bombers of No. 9 & 617 Squadrons used the ”Tallboy” bombs to penetrate these bunkers and destroyed 52 of the fleet of 53 E-Boats. Tallboy “earthquake” bombs were 12000 Lbs, designed by Barnes Wallace and could only be utilised on specially adapted Avro Lancaster bombers of No 9 & 617 Squadrons.

The Miller Magic Big Band

Miller Magic is a 17- piece swing orchestra which was formed towards the end of 2015 by musicians from The Sleaford Concert Band. The Band stayed under the auspices of the SCB until 2021 when it became an independent organisation.

In the early years the band specialised in playing the music of Glenn Miller but demand dictated that it widened its repertoire and it now also plays music of the Big Band Greats, Frank Sinatra, The Beatles and Michael Buble.

As the music changed so did the personnel. Male and female vocalists have been introduced and they now have a pool of professional, semi-professional and amateur musicians who regularly perform with the band. The band has been honoured to perform at our annual Bomber County Charity Concert, this year and last, the Woodhall Spa 40’s Weekend, Lincoln Castle, Bath Halls in Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire Aviation Museum in East Kirby, Lincolnshire Showground, The South Holland Centre and many villages 40’s events in and around Sleaford.

We, and the band, are particularly pleased that they are once again supporting the RAFA Wings Appeal, this year.

Registered Charity 226686 (England and Wales) SC037673 (Scotland)