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← Great Bowden Recital Trust

2025-05-31-accounts

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Great Bowden Recital Trust

Financial Report 2024-25

Music development, appreciation and participation for all

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ABOUT GBRT

Great Bowden Recital Trust (GBRT) was founded in 2004 and registered as a charitable trust in 2006 with charitable purpose of ‘Music development, appreciation and participation for all’. GBRT promotes music in South Leicestershire and North Northamptonshire by running a range of community choirs and ensembles, organising concerts and events and European concert tours, running an annual talent competition for young musicians and singers and providing performance opportunities for primary school children. Surplus funds generated by these activities are used to fund a grant programme for young people in financial need to help to pay for singing and instrumental lessons.

GBRT’s Trustees

GBRT is managed by volunteer Trustees and Choir/Ensemble Secretaries. New Trustees are recruited by invitation from the Trustee board and are provided with copies of the most recent accounts. They are also briefed on their legal obligations under charity laws, and on the content of the governing document of the Trust, together with the decision-making processes and recent financial performance.

The trustees during the 2024/25 financial year were:

Sue Benson, Managing Trustee

Linda Pentland, Finance Trustee and Chairman

Graham Vick

Poppy Shortland Debbie Smith Lucy Ingall Jim Holyoak Penny Nicholson (appointed March 2025) Mia Stone (appointed March 2025)

Music Development

We received 11 applications for funding for our grant programme in 2024/25. Ten of these applications were successful, including 9 continuing students and one new applicant. A total of £3,249 was awarded to fund 384 lessons.

GBRT is a member of the Harborough Alliance for Music Education, a forum to bring together music leads from local schools organised by Robert Smyth Academy. We are also involved with Creative Harborough, an initiative to promote arts activities in the town and encourage more people to get involved.

Music Appreciation

GBRT organised six concerts and gigs during the 2024/25 financial year:

Great Bowden Recital Trust, Registered Office: 30 Nelson Street, Leicester LE1 7BA Registered Charity Number: 1118140

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GBRT’s choirs and ensembles also took part in the following events organised by other organisations:

Music Participation

GBRT’s five choirs and ensembles — Community Choir and Flute Choir for over-18s, Carnival Drums and Community Orchestra for all ages, and Youth Choir for school years 5-13 - are funded by termly subscription fees which cover the costs associated with running the group as detailed below. Surplus funds are used to fund the charity’s general running costs and grant programme.

In September 2024 we launched Men Sing for Movember, a project to encourage more men to try singing ina choir which was inspired by the Men Together in Song project run by Peterborough Sings! We exceeded our target of 30 men with nearly 40 signing up for the project and attending 8 sessions in the Autumn term. Most of the participants continued until the end of the project which culminated in a very special performance of the four songs they had learned in GBRT’s Christmas Concert in December. Feedback from participants was overwhelmingly positive with all who completed the feedback form giving a satisfaction score of 5 out of 5. Eight men have gone on to join GBRT Community Choir and the majority of men who hadn’t sung in a choir before said that they would like to continue to do so in future. Participants also raised £650 for Movember.

GBRT Junior X Factor 2025 heats were held on 15" March and 11 talented young people took place in the Finals Concert on Saturday 22" March. The competition was supported by a grant from Leicestershire and Rutland Freemasons Charity.

GBRT worked with Robert Smyth Academy, LeicesterShire Music and Harborough Alliance for Music Education to set up a project to provide performance opportunities for local primary school children. GBRT Trustee Graham

Great Bowden Recital Trust, Registered Office: 30 Nelson Street, Leicester LE1 7BA Registered Charity Number: 1118140

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Vick went into each school to lead three 90-minute sessions to teach songs to Year 5 children which they then performed together as a massed choir in two concerts along with some of RSA’s ensembles and young musicians. The aim of the project is to provide a high-quality music experience for primary school children and to give the children and their parents and carers the opportunity to see what can be achieved at secondary school level in the hope that some will be inspired to want to learn an instrument themselves. Following the success of the pilot project in Autumn 2024, featuring Church Langton, Great Bowden, Meadowdale and Ridgeway primary schools, the project was repeated in Spring 2025 with Farndon Fields, Market Harborough C of E and St Joseph’s primary schools and will continue in 2025/26. The project is self-funding with proceeds from ticket sales to parents covering the costs of teaching the songs in school and putting on two performances.

GBRT worked with LeicesterShire Music to bring a new after school! Snazzy Strings beginner group to Great Bowden. The group is open to anyone under 18 who wants to try a string instrument with no previous experience or instrument needed.

For All

In September 2023 GBRT was selected as one of four music groups from across the UK to take part in a pilot project on inclusion run by Making Music, the umbrella body for leisure-time music groups. Funded by Arts Council England, INCLUDE aims to help member groups in Levelling Up for Culture Places in England connect with new members of their community and include a wider diversity of people in their normal activities. Diversity means including the widest range of people from our community and recognising, respecting and celebrating each other’s differences. This includes a broad range of identities such as ethnicity, disability, neurodiversity, gender, sexuality, and socioeconomic background.

This work continued in 2024/25:

Great Bowden Recital Trust, Registered Office: 30 Nelson Street, Leicester LE1 7BA Registered Charity Number: 1118140

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GBRT was proud to be involved in the project and will continue to be a member of Making Music's inclusion working group as well as keeping inclusion on the agenda for our own trustee meetings.

Legacy

in 2023 we were very honoured and grateful to receive a generous legacy from the estate of Elizabeth Howe, who was a member of GBRT Carnival Drums and a supporter of our charity. GBRT’s trustees have given careful consideration to how best to use these funds to have a long-lasting impact. In Autumn 2024 we awarded the first Elizabeth Howe Bursaries to five primary school students in receipt of Pupil Premium support to enable them to begin cello lessons. These students will be fully funded for their instrument hire and lessons up the end of primary school. Funds from the legacy were also used to repair and update instruments for Carnival Drums.

GOING CONCERN

Subscriptions

GBRT’s main source of income is subscriptions paid by members of its choirs and ensembles. These are paid in advance before the start of each term. MDs are engaged to run these rehearsals on a freelance basis, which allows flexibility. Trustees regularly review the subs income received for each choir and ensemble to ensure that the costs of rehearsals can be met, and are able to adjust the number and/or length of rehearsals offered if necessary. There is currently sufficient surplus generated from subs to fund GBRT’s essential running costs and grant programme.

Concerts and Events

The Trust generates additional income from donations made by audience members at concerts and performances.

Essential Running Costs

As the Trust does not own or rent any offices or employ any staff, essential running costs (e.g. insurance and independent examiner fees) are relatively modest. The Trust is carrying forward sufficient surplus funds from the 2024/25 financial year to cover all essential costs for 2025/26.

Grant Programme

The Trust uses any surplus generated from its other activities to fund a grant programme for young singers and instrumentalists who need help to pay for their specialist music lessons. The grant programme is funded from the surplus generated in the previous financial year and amount of funding made available can be adjusted according to the available funds. Grants are awarded for one school year.

Going Concern

For the reasons set out above, GBRT’s Trustees are confident that the Trust will continue to be a going concern throughout the 2025/26 financial year.

Great Bowden Recital Trust, Registered Office: 30 Nelson Street, Leicester LE1 7BA Registered Charity Number: 1118140

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Great Bowden Recital Trust, Registered Office: 30 Nelson Street, Leicester LE1 7BA Registered Charity Number: 1118140

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GBRT ASSETS AND LIABILITIES SUMMARY

Monetary Assets

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1% June 2024 31° May 2095
Funds in GBRT Bank Accounts £21,242.20 £19,487.98
Creditors
Invoices due to be paid for this period £0.00 £0.00
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Reserves

The Trust maintains minimal reserves sufficient to meet its day-to-day requirements

Public Benefit

The Trustees confirm that they have referred to the guidance contained in the Charity Commission’s general guidance on public benefit when reviewing the Trust’s aims and objectives and in planning future activities.

GBRT Trustees’ Declaration

The Trustees have thoroughly reviewed and understood all aspects of the accounting information for the period 1% June 2024 to 31 May 2025, have had regard to the guidance published by the Charity Commission on public benefit and approve, in full, the figures provided within this Report and the Income and Expenditure Summary.

Signed on behalf of the Trustees

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Linda Pentland
Chair of Trustees
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INDEPENDENT EXAMINER’S REPORT TO THE TRUSTEES OF GREAT BOWDEN RECITAL TRUST FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MAY 2025

| report to the charity trustees on my examination of the accounts of the charity for the year ended 31 May 2025.

Responsibilities and basis of report

As the charity’s trustees you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (‘the Act’).

| report in respect of my examination of the charity’s accounts carried out under section 145 of the Act and in carrying out my examination | have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.

Independent examiner's statement

| have completed my examination. | confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect:

  1. accounting records were not kept in respect of the charity as required by section 130 of[the][Act;] or

  2. the accounts do not accord with those records.

| have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

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Alexander West FCA
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Somerbys Chartered Accountants

30 Nelson Street Leicester LE1 7BA