History of the Music Service
Bury Music Service was founded in September 1973 as a direct result of an instrumental course for young people, organised by Jeffrey Wynn Davies who had just been appointed the first Music Adviser to the former County Borough of Bury. Its first ‘home’ was the Mosses Community Centre in the heart of Bury. From the outset, young people from schools in Tottington, Ramsbottom, Radcliffe, Whitefield and Prestwich were encouraged to join their counterparts in Bury on Saturday mornings each week, and so a truly Metropolitan Centre came into being some seven months before the actual date of Local Government reorganisation.
As the Bury MBC Instrumental Teaching Service we taught in all high schools and virtually every primary school until August 1993 when the Service was discontinued as part of Bury Council’s financial policy.
Rather than leave Bury schools bereft of instrumental teaching, in September 1993 Bury Music Service Limited, a non-profit making organisation, was established. Mr Wynn Davies became Managing Director; Paul Jarvis ex LEA Head of Strings became Director of Studies and Lawrence Yates, ex LEA Head of Brass, became Director/Senior Teacher.
Since 1993, Bury Music Service Ltd. has been far and away the biggest provider of musical instrument lessons and other music support within the Borough. The Company, now in its fifteenth year is delighted to be carrying on the tradition of bringing music to Bury’s schools. We offer tuition on a whole range of instruments, and pupils have free use of their chosen instrument. We also provide vocal coaching in some of the high schools. Recently we have become highly involved with the Wider Opportunities Project and provide this service to an increasing number of primary schools. Muffin Man Music is our music class for children aged 0-4 and their parents/guardians, which is held at the music service. We also work closely with nursery departments of primary schools, providing music and movement classes to the early years foundation stage whilst also providing PPA cover in some primary schools. During each spring term, we are involved in ‘Children of Bury Sing’ in which some thirty two primary schools take part at Bury Leisure Centre.
We have an excellent teaching staff and almost all are music graduates who are selected for their teaching ability and caring attitude towards children. Four members of our current teaching staff were themselves our own pupils who have graduated to become excellent teachers. Over the years we have had, and indeed, are still obtaining, outstanding results in national music examinations, largely with the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music and also Trinity College London.
Bury Music Service is also responsible for running Bury Music Centre. The imposition of fees for lessons and attendance at the Music Centre has obviously had some impact on numbers, but despite this the centre is still able to boast several orchestras, bands and ensembles as well as groups formed especially for specific occasions and run by staff in their own time. Almost all of the groups which existed before the discontinuation of the LEA service are still performing. On Friday evenings and Saturday mornings, at its Mersey Drive campus, it welcomes some two hundred and fifty young people aged eight to eighteen. These youngsters play in a tremendous variety of performing units, including bands, orchestras and groups graded to cater for the different levels of age and experience.
Our senior orchestras and concert bands have performed at the former Free Trade Hall, the Royal Northern College of Music, and the prestigious Bridgewater Hall in Manchester. We hold concerts throughout the year in Bury venues, with our showcase concerts being held at the Elizabethan Suite during the summer term. These take place over three or four evenings and feature all Music Centre pupils from the most junior groups through to our Youth Orchestra and Youth Concert Band. We have many requests from schools and charity organisations to supply groups to support school fairs and concerts. At the invitation of the Town Hall and LEA, the Music Centre has also provided groups to play for various civic events.
Director of Studies, Paul Jarvis, has commented that “the Music Centre is a very special place that has influenced the lives of countless youngsters over the past thirty five years”. Indeed, some of our past students now play in national orchestras, e.g. The Halle, Liverpool Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra and the National Orchestra of Wales. We currently have students that perform with the Halle Youth Choir and Youth Orchestra, and several of our ex members are currently students at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester.
At the present time we have thirty four teaching staff and two administrative staff. The company is still run by the same three directors who founded it in 1993.
January 2011
