The Miami Showband
The band's career was interrupted at the height of their fame when three members – Fran O'Toole, Tony Geraghty, and Brian McCoy – were killed in 1975 by loyalist terrorists, in a botched attack initially intended to convince the United Kingdom government that the band had been involved in smuggling explosives across the Irish border.
He recruited an existing group, the Downbeats Quartet, comprising Joe Tyrell (piano), Tony Bogan (drums), Clem Quinn (guitar), and Martin Phelan (saxophone), and augmented them with singer Jimmy Harte who at the time was a member of The Ambassadors Showband in Dublin, joined trumpeter Tommy O'Rourke, trombonist and vocalist Murty Quinn, and bass player Denis Murray.
For family reasons, and to finish his education in early 1963 Jimmy left the Miami, by now a very successful band, and a replacement, Dickie Rock (at the time, a member of another group, the Melochords) was found.
The group released an album, The Wind Will Change Tomorrow, in 1970, and in the early 1970s played a residency in Las Vegas and performed at Carnegie Hall.
The group then comprised Des Lee, Brian McCoy, Tony Geraghty, Fran O'Toole, Steve Travers and Ray Millar.
The band played live for an estimated 450 people before drummer Ray Millar left to spend the evening with his parents in Antrim.
At approximately 2:30 a.m. on 31 July 1975, the band were stopped at a bogus military checkpoint by gunmen dressed in British Army uniform in the townland of Buskhill, outside of Newry.
[11][14] Two gunmen, Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville, attempted to hide a time bomb on the minibus, with the intention for the device to explode upon the band's reaching the Republic of Ireland.
However, the device exploded prematurely, killing both Boyle and Somerville and hurling the band's saxophonist, Des Lee, into a ditch.
Following that, a tour was organised in 2008 with the trio being augmented by Gerry Brown, Johnny Fean (formerly of the band Horslips), and Barry Woods.
The venue for this concert was a location in Banbridge, close to the Castle Ballroom, where the band had played on the evening prior to the UVF ambush.
[2] In an interview granted to the press prior to this gig, saxophonist Des Lea stated: "It will be a very fitting close in Banbridge; it's going to be a very emotional evening as we're back in the town where the massacre occurred.
A monument at Parnell Square North, Dublin, dedicated to the dead Miami Showband members, was unveiled at a ceremony on 10 December 2007 attended by Lee and Travers.
