Generation Ladywood

Inspiring a New Generation to Enjoy a Lifelong Love of Music

Generation Ladywood is Town Hall Symphony Hall's long-term project to connect Ladywood residents to music. Please consider supporting our aim of inspiring new generations and creating a musical legacy in the district.

We are committed to improving the life chances of children growing up in Ladywood. Working with top-quality partners, we ensure opportunities to learn and make music are prominent throughout Ladywood. Activities range from:

• Enabling school children to learn how to play music with professional jazz musicians;
• Pop-up performances in school playgrounds;
• Musical Picnics on-site and in Children’s Centres;
• Supporting people – often in challenging circumstances – to attend concerts.

Importantly, the reach of our work is not just schools, but community organisations, and businesses. We have immersed 13,000 young people and their families in a world of music to support life skills, self-confidence, and well-being.

Together with our audiences and funders, Generation Ladywood is achieving amazing things. We've helped to boost Ladywood residents' self-confidence and life skills, and enabled them to feel proud of being part of their communities. Over the next three years, THSH hopes to develop and expand our programme. We want to work in schools and the community to support a lifelong love of music for all the Ladywood residents, encourage intergenerational learning and celebrate diversity.

The project is now in its seventh year and, to date, we've raised well over £460,000. As a registered charity, we need your ongoing support.

Photos by Kate Green

Generation Ladywood Showcase Performances & the Jazz Electives Project

Jazz Electives introduces hundreds of school children to a world of jazz and brings them together to perform live on stage at Symphony Hall in the Generation Ladywood Showcase. Services for Education Music Service are our committed partner.

Following a national recruitment, we commission a nationally-recognised jazz musician to develop a new composition, which Birmingham Music Service tutors provide weekly in-school tuition to enable the children to learn the new piece.

Jazz Electives brings together Ladywood schools and exceptional jazz musicians. Previous musicians involved in composing music for the project included:

• Jazz trumpeter Abram Wilson
• British-Asian clarinettist, composer and music educator Arun Ghosh
• Jazz saxophonist Mark Lockheart, part of Mercury-nominated British jazz quintet Polar Bear
• Composer, arranger and saxophonist Jason Yarde, winner of the inaugural Contemporary Jazz Composition Award at the 2009 British Composer Awards
• Well-established Birmingham-based composer, educator and performer: Sid Peacock.

Photos by Kate Green

This exciting project for 2017 featured more world-premiere compositions created with, and inspired by the young people in Ladywood schools:

• Nikki Yeoh (jazz pianist who has played with Chick Corea, The Roots amongst others) for the Key Stage 2 commission
• Keiran Mcleod (up-and-coming Scottish trombone player, Riot Jazz Brass Band, Young Pilgrims among others) for the Key Stage 3 commission.

We are very grateful to Service Birmingham for sponsoring the 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 & 2017 Generation Ladywood Showcase performances.

Learn More About Generation Ladywood

To get involved or support this vital community work, contact Becky Woodcock on 0121 644 5185 or at becky.woodcock@thsh.co.uk.