The Kirkintilloch Youth Band has been awarded a Youth Music Initiative (YMI) Grant of £29,792 meet the cost of enabling children to receive weekly brass tuition, supplemented with workshops for both children and tutors.

Two year project

The award from the Scottish Arts Council represents a major contribution to a two year project with total costs in excess of £70,000.

Competing

The Youth Band was only formed in October 2008 under Lynda Nicholson and will be attending this year’s Scottish Youth Championships in Perth at the end of November.

The band currently has 37 members with 27 of them receiving weekly tuition from the band’s tutors, Steve Stewart and Andy McKreel.

The new project runs for 2 years and will enable the band to develop its relationship with East Dunbartonshire Schools Instrumental Tuition Services4BR

Project

The new project runs for 2 years and will enable the band to develop its relationship with East Dunbartonshire Schools Instrumental Tuition Services headed by George Kelly.

Currently the band has 2 partner primary schools where they supplement the Instrumental Tuition Service’s work and this will be increased to 6 over the project term.

It is anticipated this will increase the numbers receiving weekly lessons from 27 to 72 and the number of players in the band from 37 to 98.

The number of tutors will increase from 2 to 7 and the band will evolve into Beginners, Intermediate and Advanced sections.

Incredible

Lynda Nicholson told 4BR: "The band has developed at an incredible rate considering we only really got started very late in 2008 and this new 2 year project will allow us to really push things forward both in terms of numbers and the quality of brass tuition and development we can provide."

Masterclasses

The grant also covers a series of brass master classes and concerts together with a tutor training programme aimed at assisting interested parties from other bands to receive training that will enable them to improve the development of their own youth bands or indeed to start up their own youth section.

Help and support

Band Administrator Allan Wardrope added: "We have had great support from many areas including Alan Edmonds at SBBA and David Whitton, our local MSP, but we must really thank George Kelly at East Dunbartonshire whose willingness to buy into the overall aim and allow us to link in with the extensive work they already provide has been invaluable in the grant being awarded."