'Someone saying you are a composer was the most powerful thing' - How South Yorkshire project is engaging children with chamber music composition

“Actually hearing music that I’d written for the first time was a defining moment. At that point I didn’t know you could become a composer, that it was a real job people could have.

"After that piece was performed I think everyone realised I was really into this. One of my teachers found out about a summer school for composition, and there I found out more about studying it.

"Music in the Round’s work was the catalyst for all of that. Someone saying to me ‘you are a composer’ was the most powerful thing.”

Now, in a full circle moment, 25-year-old Georgia is one of the composers who has been working with students across South Yorkshire as part of a pilot initiative called WeCompose with Music in the Round.

The scheme has helped 183 young people from ten schools to write and then finesse their own music to be performed live by professional classical musicians.

Like many children taking part in WeCompose, then head girl Georgia did not have access to musical opportunities such as owning an instrument.

She would race into the school’s music room every break time to write songs on the computer there instead.

She says: “I remember having some lessons but it was a financial pressure for my family, and when my lessons stopped it was really sad.

"There are children who have a love for music inside them and it’s so important that there is some way for them to express it, whether they become a musician or not.”

Sheffield-based Music in the Round is the leading national promoter of chamber music and presents concerts each year at both the Crucible in Sheffield and other venues around the country, particularly in areas where there is little or no other provision of professional classical music.

Its WeCompose initiative launched in January for Key Stage 3 students, including training for teachers.

Four Sheffield high schools took part in the pilot project, alongside one in Rotherham, four in Doncaster and one in Barnsley.

Students worked with the five wind players of the Bridge Ensemble, a Music in the Round-supported group of musicians from backgrounds under-represented in chamber music, to compose quintets to be performed at events across South Yorkshire.

They were also visited by three professional composers – Georgia, Laurence Osborn and Ellen Sargen, who helped to develop their work.

Some students had little or no experience of music outside of compulsory school lessons, so traditional composition methods were adapted.

Ellen, who also managed the project, says: “We had to find different ways to engage students in the project.

"We did a lot of rhythm work such as clapping exercises, a lot of harmony work, and soon they were writing melodies.

"It was incredible. I’m so proud of the students who had never done anything like this before. They’ve written four pieces of music now.”

One group of students used the digital creation studio GarageBand to craft their work, and the piece was then transcribed into music for the Bridge Ensemble. Others wrote dance music which was then adapted.

Ellen says: “When students heard their music for the first time they were blown away. One of the teachers told us that students are now writing music independently. All of the music they made was so different.

"The students had such fantastic imaginations and they embraced the idea they could write a piece about whatever they wanted. It was very diverse and creative.”

The final stage of WeCompose was a culmination day where students heard their music in a workshop, shaped it further and then saw it performed in a concert by the Bridge Ensemble.

The premiere included other composers’ work, so pieces both 100-years-old and mere days old sat side-by-side in one concert.

Ellen explains: “At the start we asked students what they thought a composer is, and a lot of them said they think a composer is someone who is dead.

“Getting them to understand they could be composers too was quite a big thing, they definitely hadn’t considered it before. We like to say there are 183 new composers in South Yorkshire now.”

WeCompose also provided training to aid the composers working in a school setting.

It will return to the same schools next year at a more advanced level for Key Stage 4 students, as well as being introduced to more schools across South Yorkshire at Key Stage 3 and expanding nationally.

Georgia says she hopes that it will have a long-lasting legacy, especially in the shadow of cuts to musical education.

“A lot of composers come from very privileged backgrounds,” she says. “Feeling your music is important enough for someone else to play is a big barrier, and there are also financial barriers and demographic barriers.

"So something like this, where composition is accessible to all, is very special.”

- musicintheround.co.uk