I’d like to thank you all for being here today, it means a great deal.
I’m so proud to be launching our new charity, Independent Venue Community bringing a social prescribing program of education, development and community activity into independent music venues during the day, throughout the year, around the country.
When I started Independent Venue Week at my kitchen table back in 2013, I couldn’t have imagined it would lead to the creation of a charity that we’d be launching 12 years later here, at the House of Commons.
I’d like to thank those that have made this event possible – Dame Caroline Dinenage MP – Chair, Culture Media and Sport Select Committee for hosting us here on the glorious day, Adam, Sara and the amazing team at Global Motion, Steph Hardwick of Hardwick & Morris, Tom and the team at UK Music and Estelle Wilkinson of Eleven Management.
This journey wouldn’t have been possible without the support from Arts Council England who have helped us to evolve IVW, developing new ideas and creative practices every year to respond to the changing environment venues and local communities are going through. Working with an organisation that can see our vision and support it in the way that they have has been instrumental in IVW’s ongoing success and the development of IVC.
Thanks must also be extended to Creative Wales, Creative Scotland and Youth Music who have also shared our vision and enabled us to put it into practice.
The results have had a huge impact on our community all around the country, on and off stage. Places that have previously been taken for granted are now much more recognised as the vital cultural hubs we’ve all known them to be for decades. And this has been amplified beautifully by BBC Radio 6 Music who share the stories of venues, artists, fans and communities for a whole week on air during IVW at the end of January every year.
I’d like to also thank our Trustees as well as our area reps all around the country who helps us reach every village, town and city and the very small team at mission control for both IVC and IVW, Adam Webb who looks after our press with Kitty Lester, Gabby Chelmicka and Liv Bailie who work alongside me across everything.
I’m also grateful to Julie Hornsby for BSL signing the event.
Those of you that know me well will know I can talk forever about our work and community. But I thought the best way for you to see and hear more about what we’ve been doing over the last few years, was directly from those who’ve been involved…
It’s so heart warming to watch so much footage from our brilliant participants, venues and delivery partners over the years – it’s hard not to feel inspired by what we’ve all just seen. Thanks to Kitty Handley for putting that video together.
So why are we here now, to launch IVC?
Well, it’s taken longer than we’d hoped but now we have charitable status, so special thanks to Erica and Livia of Bates Wells for their patience and dogged determination with the Charities Commission.
But, we’ve never had the chance to share with you all, what we’ve been doing and what our ambitions are. And the eternal optimist in me honestly believes that these challenges and delays have led us to this point for a reason.
At a time when communities around the country are feeling polarised, the music industry and our creators are also facing increasing challenges at home, internationally and online.
After the pandemic, we have a generation who haven’t been able to enjoy the right-of-passage into adulthood and all the exciting real world experiences that brings. And so many underserved communities are feeling more marginalised than ever before.
But now, many people are stepping back from the unrealistic online lives that social media feeds them, and are looking for, in person experiences.
For real connections, with real people in the real world.
Music connects people in a way that nothing else can. You only have to watch a toddler bouncing around to music or someone with dementia to come alive when they hear music from their past to know it reaches into our souls.
Music is a force for good like no other.
We have the most incredible network of independent venues all around this country where all of this starts. Run by passionate people who live in those local communities, employ local people and create jobs and creative scenes on their doorstep.
It has been the privilege of my 20+ career in the music industry to travel around the country discovering some amazing villages, towns and cities that I would never have visited if it wasn’t for music. I’ve got to meet some of the most charismatic, maverick, mischievous, passionate and hard working people I’m now lucky enough to call friends.
It was a trip to Hull in 2014 and seeing the magical relationship between The New Adelphi Club run by the inimitable Jacko and Youth Project The Warren, less than a couple of miles down the road, that was my penny-drop moment.
Young people from the Warren were being taken down to the Adelphi to see first hand, how a live music venue works, how a band loads in, what happens in soundchecks and how a show runs. And more importantly, they were getting involved, helping out and without realising it, starting their career in the music industry.
So many young people that don’t fit into a traditional education environment, are often bright but bored and ignored.
How perfect then, would a career in live music be. Unconventional hours, being on the road travelling, often internationally and working in the creative industries. So we set up some workshops to help make this a more formal journey for them.
And we were meeting more people and organisations from a variety of sectors who wanted to collaborate and reach our network of venues.
Organisations advocating for disabled people, those facing mental health challenges and the LGBTQIA+ community.
So, somewhat quietly and gradually, we started to create programmes with and for them all.
We learned quickly “Nothing About Us Without Us”
This has now become one of two of our core mantras, the other being
“If You Can See It, You Can Be It”. We want people to be able to see themselves on stage and working behind the scenes, irrespective of their personal characteristics, their background or where they’re from and we want to work WITH them to build these programmes.
This has led us to our current offering across seven strands and we recognise the intersectionality of these areas;
- Early Years
- Young People
- Deaf People, Disabled and Neurodivergent
- Those facing Mental Health and Wellbeing Challenges,
- The LGBTQIA+ community
- And The Older generation
- And our new environmental strand, Grow
These venues are now becoming so many people’s Third Place, the place that features most prominently in people’s lives after home and work.
And if you want to build a career in the music industry but don’t know anyone, how do you get a foot in the door? Well the easiest door to open is that of your local venue.
So, what better way to let our communities know we’re here for them than to have people with a public voice.
After their brilliant Brits win and outstanding acceptance speech, we are over the moon to announce Independent Venue Community Ambassadors, The Last Dinner Party.
Alongside The Last Dinner Party as Ambassadors, we are also announcing 18 Patrons including artists and those working within the industry. Many are in the room today; Ben Lovett – Mumford and Sons and Managing Partner, The Venue Group, Big Jeff – Artist, Music Fan, Musician, Bishi – Artist, Brooke Combe – Artist IVW Ambassador Scotland, Christine Osazuwa – Founder of Measure of Music, David Martin – CEO of the Featured Artist Coalition, Emma Snook – Director of Marketing UK, Partisan Records, Lambrini Girls – Artist, Life – Artist, Nuha Ruby Ra – Artist, Philip Selway – Artist and IVW Ambassador, Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – Artist, Public Service Broadcasting – Artist, Sara Gleadhall – Global Motion, Sarah Jones – General Manager, Songkick, Sarah Wilson – Head of Tunecore, UK & Australia, Tasha Gregory – Co-Director Mother Artists, Wozzy Brewster OBE, FRSA – Founder, Executive Director, The Midi Music Company.
Having this level of endorsement from across the industry is not only a privilege but it shows how strongly people feel about our work and what collectively we can achieve.
These spaces are part of the fabric of the community. They provide an access point for culture and self-expression. They provide opportunities. And they can play a far deeper role alongside live music.
Our goal is to drive more of this additional activity into venues during the day, so they can sustain themselves alongside live music, explore additional revenue streams directly and indirectly and grow their relationships with local community groups.
Music is something that is open to all. It enables people, often challenged by traditional education and training, the chance to develop new skills, opening up opportunities to work in and enjoy arts and culture. Our creative industries are one of the UK’s greatest assets and talent exists all around the country. Music is a wonderful way to help discover, unlock and nurture it.
I believe it’s on us, as the industry, to go out and find the next generation, nurture, train and develop these people to create a representative music industry of the future. We want everyone to have opportunities to work in the creative industries. We want the next generation to be able to see themselves when they go to a show, on and off stage.
And we want them to tell us what they need so we can shape these programmes together. We should not be expecting people to have to leave where they are from to find opportunities, we want to take opportunities to them and help build creative communities across the country.
IVC is created for the people by and with the people it serves. Through the network and platform we have built in villages, towns and cities, we can and must help make that happen for people who might not otherwise get those opportunities.
I feel this launch is very timely. I feel we’re hitting the zeitgeist. A female founded and run venue charity which is all about the people and the music ecosystem. And about the communities they are in the heart of.
Over the last 10 years, we have told numerous positive stories about music communities in every nook and cranny of this country. We want to tell even more over the next decade, expanding our narrative with a bolder IVC programme, to build a much more representative music industry with people from all walks of life.
Venues are so much more than just places for live music – they are cultural hubs for learning, creativity, arts and culture more widely connecting people in their local community of all ages, backgrounds, abilities, genders, ethnicities, skills, experiences and walks of life.
These venues, invariably local businesses, are the backbone of the live music scene and we recognises all that they have done to create some of the most memorable nights of the past so they can continue to do the same in the future.
Even though IVW and IVC are entirely separate entities, they are connected at their very core by a passion for positivity, a culture for creativity, and a welcome for all.
We can’t do this without you. and we don’t want to.
We need your artists, we need your crew, we need your business to offer mentorships, internships, opportunities.
And we need your backing and your support. We have outlined 5 aims we want to achieve;
- nurture local creative communities
- develop cultural hubs
- evolve venue sustainability
- grow a representative creative industry
- and create opportunities for all
Today is for the unseen, the unheard, the undiscovered and the unbelievable talent of tomorrow who will make up our creative industries and creative communities of the future.