We are very grateful to Thornton & Ross for their donation of a further £5000 from their Anti-Knife Crime Fund, enabling us to continue our work with referrals from Kirklees Youth Justice. This project gives opportunities for young people with an interest in music production and song writing to attend regular music-based activity, in order to build their confidence and self-esteem. Our workshops include lyric writing and talking about expressing emotions and thoughts in a self-controlled way; being respectful of others and thinking carefully about self-expression. We have worked with groups of young people at risk of offending to find opportunities to do things that take them away from being drawn into crime. The music we create with these young people addresses issues of identity, safety and turning away from poor choices in lifestyle that are often used in music. We confront the use of language and glorification of criminality.

The music we create with these young people addresses issues of identity, safety and turning away from poor choices in lifestyle that are often used in contemporary popular music.

Young people referred to this project get a 10 week course of hourly one to one sessions, after which we signpost them onto other opportunities or find alternative funding for them to continue to work with us.

We recently received feedback regarding a young person who started working with us with support from the Thornton and Ross fund. Further sessions were then funded by his school, as they could see the benefit and impact they were having on him:

"For his own safety, SG has now been rehoused out of the area (so is unable to continue the sessions going forwards). I met with SG yesterday at his new placement and he played me a couple of his “unreleased” tracks... I have to say I was blown away by the level of personal reflection that SG was able to put into these tracks. He’d covered areas very personal to him and it felt very raw and honest. I do think this has really helped SG to process his feelings and make some sense of his own experiences. So, a big thank you from me (to Dan) as I know SG has really enjoyed the sessions, but more importantly SG asked me to pass on his thanks to you as well. He says he will miss it."

Shirley McFadden, Youth Engagement Officer