www.totallymusic.com<\/a> to hold virtual classes and keep the music lessons alive.<\/p>\nTheir pioneering approach, with backing from the Welsh Government, was honoured at the prestigious Social Business Wales Awards where they won the technology category, Tech for Good.<\/p>\n
Mr Isherwood said: \u201cI am incredibly impressed with what they have achieved since the cooperative was established seven years ago when council-run music services came to an end..<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m a great fan of community enterprise and this shows how it works, not only in terms of expertise but also in terms of passion, commitment and a community voice coming together and creating such success.<\/p>\n
\u201cWrexham and Denbighshire councils are on board and the opportunity is for so many more to take advantage of this service at a time when councils going the other way, either removing a service altogether or considering making their music teachers redundant.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a solution, working locally, but it needs more sustainable support.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m pleased to give it my full support and I\u2019ll go down to Cardiff and advocate with the Welsh Government.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs we\u2019ve heard today, the more local authorities that come on board, the cheaper the relative cost of providing those services and therefore the more people they can reach. So, it\u2019s a win-win.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy message to other local authorities in North Wales is to look at what they\u2019re doing here, look at what they\u2019ve achieved and then compare that with what they\u2019re able to offer or potentially considering reducing the offer in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cooperative founder and head of service Heather Powell was grateful to Mr Isherwood for his support.<\/p>\n
She said: \u201cThere is a discussion at the Senedd about a rollout of a national music service for Wales.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile it\u2019s great that there\u2019s going to be more funding for music services across Wales, it\u2019s also important to recognise that it can be delivered successfully by a third sector organisation like the North Wales Music Cooperative.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t necessarily have to be a local authority service. We have very successful working partnerships with both our local authorities but it works very well having a cooperative which is also a Labour Party model for delivery.<\/p>\n
\u201cSharing premises, with a cooperative of cooperatives if you like, means that we can deliver the service more cost effectively across both authorities that we cover.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe rely a lot on grants. We rely a lot on goodwill and good working relationships and living hand to mouth, having to apply for funding every year.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be a massive help to have some longer term security in a service that\u2019s already been through redundancy, already been through cuts.<\/p>\n
\u201cWales is a cultural country and rightly famed for being the Land of Song so it is only right that our music should be safeguarded.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a sentiment echoed by cooperative chair Cllr Mark Young who said: \u201cWe are grateful to our local authority funders and the Welsh Government who have all invested in us and enabled us to create a successful model that can be rolled-out to other areas.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we need is a long term commitment of funding over two or three years, or preferably five years. It would be better for the pupils and better for the teachers we employ.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur ambition is to grow so that we can bring music to more and more children and do so even more cost-effectively through economies of scale, delivering even greater value for money.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mike Williams, from Social Business Wales, has been involved with the North Wales Music Cooperative since its inception.<\/p>\n
He said: \u201cFrom a standing start seven years ago, they\u2019ve developed a very successful model and they were able to expand their service during the pandemic through the delivery of virtual music lessons and virtual concerts.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe music cooperative powered ahead and put a programme together within a remarkably short time, reaching 1000 children a week, not just benefitting from the music itself but from the wellbeing that\u2019s been proven to follow through with that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s huge potential to expand but ensuring it receives the right support is critical and something that would really be useful would be the development of a model of finance that would allow security over not just 12 months, as the current contract has to be with the authorities.<\/p>\n
\u201cFive years of course, would be ideal because it would allow for future planning, the taking of strategic decisions with confidence and that could only lead to a better and an improved service.\u201d<\/p>\n
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