One Saturday morning 12 years ago, I plucked up the courage to shuffle into the Sunderland Youth Music Workshops.
At 16, I was obsessed with music but technically hopeless. I was desperately searching for a creative outlet.What I found that day was a safe, welcoming, buzzing hub. Or what workshop founder and leader Dave Murray calls “a dreamland.”
I was elated to find a place like this existed outside of my imagination. The project then was very rough around the edges, run from the run down ‘Bunker’ rehearsal studios in the city centre.
The place has since been gentrified but former youth workers at the project inform me that they would often have to sweep the place for needles before the its participants arrived.
Regardless of the insalubrious surroundings, the workshops were incredible. I would emerge into the afternoon light blinking, ears ringing and throat red raw from screaming my lungs out.
The thing that really blew my mind was the level of acceptance and inclusion. In a city that often seemed deeply cruel, it was the incredibly liberating.
The project started in 1994 with the aim of giving young people a chance to learn to play instruments, write songs, form bands and improve their social skills in an informal, free, peer driven setting.
The project played a huge part in establishing many an aspiring Sunderland Musician and the Project is not without its high profile success stories.
The workshops were a launch pad for such internationally renowned acts such as The Futureheads, Field Music and The Casino Brawl.
And while these names help raise the profile of the project and draw extra funding they are a footnote in the legacy of the award winning institution.
Thousands of young people have came through the door and been welcomed by Dave and I there are very few who didn’t gain something positive from the workshops.
One of which is Anna McKeown, now 25, attended the project when still in her early teens and the experience has left an indelible impression on her.
“I think the project shaped who I am, it provided me with an interest in music, it inspired me, gave me ambition, a sense of purpose and a lot of friends.” She said.
Anna was so inspired by the ethos of the workshops that she now runs her own youth groups teaching broadcast journalism to young people in Sunderland.
She believes that the music projects have an important function in the community, “It's so important that projects like this exist because at the most basic level it provides an opportunity for young people to socialise outside of school, the drinking green or the x-box.” She said, adding, “they can develop skills and a sense of independence and self-worth.”
The project is still going strong as it enters its 16th year. While it has been scrubbed up with a new venue and state of the art gear, it still retains its grassroots, underdog spirit.
This is largely due to project leader Dave Murray. Dave is a no-nonsense type of bloke but he is also incredibly kind, warm hearted and likeable. Dave will do anything he can for these kids.
Been kicked out by your parents? Dave will find you a room. Need help wallpapering that room? Dave will give you a hand. No telly in the room? Dave saw one in the skip out back; he’ll get it fixed up for you.
His one passion in life is the youth music workshops and the young people who go there. Dave loves to talk about the project so much that my 20 minute interview with him nearly lasted 3 hours.
Yet hearing him talking about something he is hugely proud of is inspiring rather than indulgent.
Dave is, however, reluctant to take credit for the success of the project even though he has devoted his whole life to it.
Sat in his office surrounded by photographs from the workshops he told me, “The success of the workshops is nothing to do with me or the workers, it’s due to the young people who come, all we do is believe in them.”
The magic of the project is driven by the young people who attend, through them supporting and encouraging each other because they are so glad to have the outlet. As Dave says, “the need for the project was much bigger than the project itself.”
Chatting to Dave about the project, while thinking of the impact it had on so many other people like Anna and Stephen, I find myself wishing I was on the TV show Secret Millionaire.
I imagine myself as a wealthy philanthropist, presenting Dave with a big cheque to help out the project.
But as Dave says, “It has never, ever been about money.” Besides I probably wouldn’t get a chance, Dave wouldn’t let me get a word in edgeways.
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