Community Music Whickham and Swalwell CIO Registered Charity Number 1162027
Trustees’ Annual Report for the year 31st March 2021
Trustees
The trustees are pleased to present this report of Community Music Whickham and Swalwell (referenced hereafter as CMWS) which was registered as a charity on 05/06/2015.The registered office is 3 Washingwell Park, Whickham, Tyne & Wear NE16 4QW
CMWS was formed by a group of people from the local community who wanted to promote and inspire standards of excellence in music, aid fulfilment of personal aspirations and enjoyment in making music and promote performances so that the local population could benefit from these activities.
Lynne Bloxham. Chair
Daniel Binns IT adviser
Brian Stoneman. Policy Advisor
Amy Tate. Coordinator of volunteers
John Treherne. Artistic Director
Lynn Wildish. Vice Chair
Alan McBurnie.Treasurer.
David Megginson. Membership lead.
Anne Lindsley. Secretary.
Jennifer Boynton. Safeguarding
Governance and Management
The governing document is the Community Music Whickham and Swalwell CIO Constitution which was adopted by the Trustees on 17/05/2015 and which became recognised by the Charity Commission when the CIO was registered on 05/06/2015.
All Trustees were briefed on the role of Trustees of CMWS, given copies of the governing documents of the organisation and referred to the detail on the Charity Commission website related to becoming a trustee and to the guidance on public benefit.
The Trustees hold regular, usually monthly meetings throughout the year. Some operational/ planning details were delegated to sub committees made up of Trustees. All meetings are minuted. During lockdown meetings were held on Zoom platform.
The Trustees work entirely on a voluntary basis.
There were three service providers who work as tutors to the ensembles .Their work is covered by a Service Level Agreement which includes clauses about quality and assessment. Tuition continued on line during lockdown.
CMWS has an honorary partnership with our two local churches, St Mary’s Whickham and Holy Trinity Church Swalwell.
Objectives
The objective of the CIO CMWS:
the provision of tuition, materials, performance opportunities, public concerts, lectures and recitals.
The Trustees confirm that when planning their activities for the year they have complied with the duty to have due regard for the public benefit in delivering the activities undertaken.
Main activities
We have continued to maintain an emphasis on providing online platforms for tuition and performance experience, and materials i.e. instruments in good repair for the participants to play.
We lend instruments to students and make no charge for this but ask the user of the instrument or parent or guardian to insure any instrument so loaned. We have several musical groups for which we provide tuition:
A Community Orchestra, a viol consort, a cello ensemble, music theory classes, a handbell ringing group and a Sing Along group, Chase Notes, which pre Covid rehearsed in a sheltered housing facility in our community. This allowed easy access for residents and is also open to nonresidents.
Everyone is welcome to join one or all of these groups without discrimination and no audition is required.The groups met weekly during term time prior to the pandemic.
During lockdown it was not possible for these groups to meet in person. We set up facilities for the continuation or rehearsal and performance where it was possible. The handbell group continued to meet weekly on Zoom. Theory tuition continued via Skype with students achieving high marks at very high level ie grades 6 and 7. Individual instrumental tuition of members of the ensembles continued via Skype.
In addition to providing the above all these groups have been given performance opportunities in various online concerts ( see below ). As a result of these performances the students and the public has benefited from a high standard of music making.
These activities and more detail of what CMWS offers is detailed in a handbook which is widely available to the public and on our website www.communitymusicws.com. The website was updated during the period of this report.
We provide facilities for individual examinations/assessments both on performance on musical instruments and also in music theory. These assessments provide markers of quality and progress. This has also continued online during the period of lockdown.
We do not make grants to individuals.
The Trustees are all volunteers and also give freely of their time to tutor ensembles, arrange, advertise, staff and supervise concerts and performances. We can also draw on a core group of other volunteers for large scale events.
Achievements and Performance
CMWS aims to encourage performance opportunities for musicians. Our diary of events has decreased in number and variety since the last report due to restrictions because of the Covid pandemic. Unfortunately the planned William Shield Festival had to be postponed for 12 months. However thanks to the enthusiasm and dedication of its Trustees it has found innovative ways to fulfil its aims and objectives during this difficult time.
Over the twelve months since the last report CMWS has supported the following:
“Movie Magic “ concert for Community Orchestra with music from the movies was planned for 21/2/20 had to be cancelled due to Covid restrictions. There had been many rehearsals for the event and it is hope that we will be able to re schedule.
Continuation of theory classes remotely.
Performance assessments - similar to examinations to asses progress of individual students.
Weekly rehearsals of handbell group Bells Up - “ air ringing” remotely in line with other groups who are members of the Handbell Ringers of Great Britain.
Online concerts for soloists and ensembles - duets, trios and handbells. Students of all ages and organised with appropriate safeguarding in place. This enabled performance experience to continue even when live concerts were not allowed.
Bells Up video recording of carols which was shown online at Community Carol Services and on the church website. Enabling the public to enjoy this performance.
Because of postponement of the live William Shield Festival CMWS provided a William “Shielding “Festival. A grant from the Sir James Knott Trust was obtained to enable CMWS to engage professional opera singers to give doorstep recital of popular songs and arias for people who were shielding. As this was outdoor it was allowed during the pandemic when restrictions were lifted later in the year.
There were four concerts outside two separate sheltered housing blocks in Gateshead . This enabled residents who had not been outside for months to hear live music through their window or front door and also enabled professional musicians who had lost all their work during the pandemic to perform.These concerts took place between December 2020 and February 2021 and were so popular that they were repeated later that year.
A similar event was held for residents of a local Neuro- Rehabilitaion centre . Each concert was 30 minutes long.
There were two more concerts both outside Care homes one in Whickham and one in Darlington. In addition three individual doorstep recitals took place.
It is clear that our arms and objectives have been met even during restrictions from the Covid pandemic.
Financial Review
During the year CMWS has continued to support and facilitate tuition of the ensembles remotely and purchased and repaired instruments for anyone who wished to borrow one without charge thus supporting the objectives of the charity.
We have a fixed set of charges for membership of the ensembles which are publicised on our website. These charges are reviewed annually. In September 2019 we introduced as new set of charges to allow for discounts for family members. Ideally we would like to attract enough funding to provide all our services without charge. As we have not met face to face during this period we have not charged any fees as we have not had to pay for premises hire.
Plans for next year
We hope that as restrictions lift that we can allow our ensembles to meet in person. We aim to attract more participants to all our ensembles. This would enable growth of CMWS but would also enhance the health and wellbeing of our local community.
In addition we planned to deliver another William Shield Festival to a public which now has high expectations of performances. We planned to resurrect more of Shields work which has not been performed in recent centuries. This was to be organised for November 2020 but will now take place in October 2021.
These plans are to ensure that we continue to provide ease of participation in events and concerts and a high quality of experience and performance for all those taking part and their audience, the public, thus fulfilling our charitable aims.
Lynne Bloxham ( Chair)
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