Bed & Breakfast in Birmingham

Birmingham

Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands county of England. Birmingham is the most populous of the English Core Cities Group, and it is the second-most populous British city, with a population of 1,006,500 (2006 estimate).

The City of Birmingham forms part of the larger West Midlands conurbation, which has a population of 2,284,093 (2001 census) and includes several neighbouring towns and cities, such as Solihull, Wolverhampton and the towns of the Black Country.

The city was a powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution in England, a fact which led to Birmingham being known as "the workshop of the world" or the "city of a thousand trades". Although Birmingham's industrial importance has declined, it has developed into a national commercial centre, being named as the third-best place in the United Kingdom to locate a business, and the 21st best in Europe by Cushman & Wakefield in 2007.

It is also the fourth-most visited city by foreign visitors in the UK. In 2007, Birmingham was ranked as the 55th-most livable city in the world and the second most livable in the UK, according to the Mercer Index of worldwide standards of living.

People from Birmingham are known as 'Brummies', a term derived from the city's nickname of 'Brum'. This comes in turn from the city's dialect name, Brummagem, which may have been derived from one of the city's earlier names, 'Bromwicham'.

There is a distinctive Brummie dialect and accent, both of which differ from the adjacent Black Country.

Birmingham has had a vibrant and varied musical history over the last century. Birmingham bands have made a major contribution to the musical culture of the United Kingdom, with many contemporary bands citing Birmingham bands as a major influence.

In the 1960s, the "Brum Beat" era featured blues and early progressive rock bands, such as The Moody Blues. In the 1980s the reggae band UB40 were formed in Moseley while boy band Musical Youth lived in the Nechells part of Birmingham. Europe's biggest music shop was in Birmingham called Woodroffes Musical Instruments.

The city is often described as the birthplace of heavy metal music, with Judas Priest, Black Sabbath and two members of Led Zeppelin being local. Then later on during the 80s bands such as Napalm Death, joined the Birmingham heavy metal scene. In the 1970s, members of The Move and The Idle Race formed the Electric Light Orchestra and Wizzard.

The 1970s also saw the rise of reggae and ska in the city with such bands as Steel Pulse, UB40, and The Beat, expounding racial unity with politically leftist lyrics and multiracial lineups, mirroring social currents in Birmingham at that time. Seminal 1980s pop band Duran Duran are also from Birmingham.

The Birmingham Triennial Music Festivals took place from 1784 to 1912. Music was specially composed, conducted or performed by Mendelssohn, Gounod, Sullivan, Dvořák, Bantock and Edward Elgar, who wrote four of his most famous choral pieces for Birmingham. Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius had its debut performance there in 1900. Composers born in the city include Albert William Ketèlbey and Andrew Glover.

Birmingham's other city-centre music venues include The National Indoor Arena, which was opened in 1991, 02 Academy in Dale End which opened in 2000, The CBSO Centre, opened in 1997, Barfly in Digbeth and the Adrian Boult Hall, which was built along with Paradise Forum and Birmingham Central Library, at Birmingham Conservatoire.

Traces of medieval Birmingham can be seen in the oldest churches, notably the original parish church, St Martin in the Bull Ring. A few other buildings from the medieval and Tudor periods survive, among them the Lad in the Lane and The Old Crown, the 15th century Saracen's Head public house and Old Grammar School in Kings Norton and Blakesley Hall.

A number of Georgian buildings survive, including St Philip's Cathedral, Soho House, Perrott's Folly, the Town Hall and much of St Paul's Square.

The Victorian era saw extensive building across the city. Major civic buildings such as the Victoria Law Courts (in characteristic red brick and terracotta), the Council House and the Museum & Art Gallery were constructed. St Chad's Cathedral was the first Roman Catholic cathedral to be built in the UK since the Reformation.

Across the city, the need to house the industrial workers gave rise to miles of redbrick streets and terraces, many of back-to-back houses, some of which were later to become inner-city slums.

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