Early History

It was by the mid-19th century that most of the local bands came into being. It was early in the year 1869 when John Azzopardi, a British Navy musician, gathered a few parishioners from Mosta and began teaching them music. One has to keep in mind that at that time, the local band clubs were the only source of entertainment to the common people. Therefore it is no surprise that the enthusiasm was high and it did not take long to form the band.

In the meantime, Mosta parish priest Rev .Anton Mallia was already planning the Consegration of the new Mosta church, the Rotunda of which the construction was completed in 1860. The chosen date was the 15th October 1871, when Archbishop Gaetano Pace Forno consagrated the Rotunda, and The Mosta Band, as the band was popularly known in its first years, performed for the first time in public. The first band director was Mro. G. Demajo.

The first years were difficult and challenging, but the committee, among whom where members of high society, established itself as a leading and social society in Mosta, and therefore was invited to take part in almost every function organized in the parish. It was in 1879 that the band was renamed as Nicolò Isouard Band by its president Prof. Napoleon Tagliaferro ISO. He was convinced that the band should bear the name of a famous Maltese composer who did proud the Maltese music. In 1894 the band was under the direction of Antonio Miruzzi, a well known local musician, who later composed the processional hymn "O Del Ciel Regina", the "Inno Alla Beata Vergine" and the "Omaggio Alla Nicolò Isouard" amongst others.