Our out of school project at Sowerby Bridge School is now underway; after some years at the school with very little music activity, we were pleasantly surprised by the trail of young people who turned up on day one with their guitars, keyboards, drums, and voices; around 90% were ‘bedroom musicians’ who, although they had instruments, had had no training in how to play them.

We call the project Elastic Band – it doesn’t matter how many members it has, or their music skills – everyone learns together. With a core membership of around 40 young people turning up regularly, they are creating their own songs and gave their first performance in the last week of term before Christmas 2005.

They’ve learned a wide range of styles already, including reggae and rock, they’ve written their own songs and they’re going from strength to strength.

"Mal Webb's beatboxing workshop had the students mesmerised! Some of the year 10s tried teaching some of his techniques in their drama lesson the next morning - so they were still talking about it."

Secondary school teacher

Yorkshire Youth & Music
Dean Clough
Halifax
West Yorkshire
HX3 5AX