Remebering the Past, Celebrating the Present and Sensing the Future

With funding from the National Foundation for Youth Music back in 2004 we sent traditional musicians into primary schools across the region to lead inclusive workshops and find children between the age of seven and nine with musical ability that had not yet found a voice within the existing music services provision.

These youngsters were offered a place at our ‘Folk Academy’ based at South Hill Park arts centre in Bracknell, where they chose for themselves from a range of folk related instruments including fiddle, mandolin, clasarch harp, uilleann pipes, bamboo flute and melodeon.

Since then the project has expanded with weekly tuition and instruments all provided free of charge in an agreement of trust which we feel reflects in the success of project, the high standard of musicianship our students have achieved and our growing capacity to offer more places to new pupils from our work in local schools.

But as a significant extension to our current work this project provides a much-needed opportunity for us to work with young people from communities at risk of social exclusion and with a limited cultural infrastructure. Giving them the opportunity to hear professional musicians from a variety of folk and traditional music genres and to engage them in open debate about their music and its origins.

The academy reflects the wider diversity of the region and is participant-led by people from diverse backgrounds. As an emerging organisation that addresses cultural needs we rely on financial support from larger organisations such as Arts Council England to help us overcome the barriers that stand in the way of universal access to and participation in the arts.

Following an extension to the project in which unused funds were used to pay for additional classes this work ceased to be funded by ACE on 14th October 2006 our plans for the long-term sustainability and development of our traditional music academy are as follows…

1. Local Network Funding & The Berkshire Community Foundation

Although the academy does not currently have sufficient funds to continue expanding as we had hoped, LNF funds from the Berkshire Community Foundation will help us to buy new instruments and to keep the work going at the level set by our 06-07 ACE funding. Plans to involve musicians from the London Sinfonietta and the composer Judith Weir have had to be delayed until the trustees of Gael Music (which was awarded charitable status in August) have had time to complete plans for restructuring the organisation. We are hoping to expand the remit of our work in the 07-08 academic year, content at present to continue widening access to the original aims of the academy.

2. Private Sponsorship

In addition to our local network funding we are indebted to the continued and kind support of The Clarke Tinwhistle Company who by the end of the 06-07 academic year will have donated £5,000 to the project. Our organisation in return is providing outlets for them to sell instruments to local borough councils and music services through our continuing work in schools.

3. Future Partnerships with Berkshire music services and local borough councils

As a result of partnerships created over the past year we now have established links with Bracknell Forest Borough Council, Slough Borough Council and Berkshire Music Services all of whom are working with us to provide tinwhistle projects in local schools through the Wider Opportunities Initiative and also as a means of find new talent for the academy. This work is set to continue over the coming year and in the case of Slough Borough Council has been extended to set up a sister project, the Slough Folk Music Academy, that is also being run by Gael Music.

To sum up

The project’s sustainability is ensured for the next year through a combination of tuition fees, LNF funds and private sponsorship but the direction in which we take the project after this will be at the discretion of our board of trustees and decided in the spring. Speaking for myself however, in my capacity as lead tutor at the academy, ceasing to provide tuition for our existing pupils is not an option since the time and energy the children have invested in the project demands nothing less than to honoured like for like.