September has been a busy month for the ABO team with the Press and PR Brass Tacks and the start of the Autumn Specialist Manager Meetings. In addition to these we have also met with the following people and organisations on your behalf:

David Baile, ISPA; Musicians Benevolent Fund; DCMS; DCSF; Louise Mitchell, Glasgow City of Music; Cardonald College; MU; Classic FM; DHA Communications; Tommy Pearson; YPIA; Steve Long, Floating Earth; ACE; Ruth Hansford, BBC; Pierre Brouchoud, Conservatoire de Paris; Susannah Simons, BBC; Sounds 2012 steering group; Ian Smith, Scottish Arts Council; UKBA; MPA. Mark also attended the launch of Year of Music with Fiona Harvey; the LSO Digital symposium; launch of the Woodhouse Centre at the RCM; and held meetings with Ministers at the Labour Party Conference.  The team attended concerts by the LPO, RSNO, BBCSO, Northern Sinfonia at Classic FM Live, and Orla and Lucy attended the official launch of Young People in the Arts.

The following Specialist Manager Meetings are scheduled for this autumn:

 
8 October: Digital Managers' Meeting, LSO Bonhill Street, London
14 October: Chamber Orchestra Managers' Meeting, Cadogan Hall, London
20 October: Finance Managers' Meeting, SOLT / TMA, London
30 October: Scottish Members' Meeting, City Halls, Albion Street, Glasgow
11 November: Concert & Orchestra Managers' Meeting, Wigmore Hall, London
19 November: Marketing Managers' Meeting, Royal Albert Hall, London
24 November: ABO Annual General Meeting & CEOs Forum, London
2 December: Opera & Ballet Managers' Meeting, English National Opera, London
 

If you would like to attend one of these meetings please log on to the Members Area of the ABO website and then click on Events and book the relevant Specialist Manager Meeting.

All that you ever wanted to know about Fundraising but were afraid to ask! - Tuesday 1 December, Course leader Sarah Gee, Senior Consultant with Dixon Raines. Course venue: LSO St. Luke's, London.

Finance for non-Finance Managers - Tuesday 8 December, Course leader Maureen McCulloch, a chartered accountant with extensive experience in charities and the arts who has been freelance trainer for twenty-one years. Course venue: LSO St. Luke's, London.

Due to requests from our members we are running two new Brass Tacks courses this autumn. As with all the ABO Brass Tacks courses places are limited so early booking is advised.
 

Make The Difference: Evaluating Education Projects - Friday 6 November, Course leader Annabel Jackson, is a professional evaluator specialising in the arts, who has worked for all the main arts funders and for a number of orchestras and other arts organisations. Annabel has been contracted by the ABO as an Evaluation Consultant and spoke at the ABO's Summer Education Managers' Meeting. Course venue: Barbican Centre, London.

Music And Me - dispelling the jargon behind health and safety on the platform - Tuesday 17 November, Course leader Jayne Sutton, a freelance Health and Safety consultant who spoke at the October 2008 ABO Concert & Orchestra Managers' Meeting. Course venue: Wigmore Hall, London.

For detailed information on the content of these valuable training opportunities please visit the Brass Tacks section of the ABO website.

A date has also been set for the ABO's annual 'Where Do I Start?' event. This one day insight into working in orchestral management is aimed at students and recent graduates - so please pass on the word to any young people you might know who are interested in maybe working in our sector. This is the 13th year of this event and fittingly it will be held on Friday 13th November at the Barbican Centre , London. Futher details including a list of speakers can be found on the ABO website.
 

The Theatrical Management Association is also offering the following course which is open to ABO members at TMA rates:

Contingency Planning: business continuity
Wednesday 4 November
Prince of Wales Theatre, London

£120 + VAT TMA/SOLT/NALGAO/ABO members

The last 10 years has demonstrated that we live in an uncertain world. Floods, fires, strikes, disease and terrorism have all tested the response of individual businesses and means that most people are spending time on contingency planning. What does this mean for the performing arts? What should Managers be doing? This seminar is designed to answer these questions, provide practical advice and give you an opportunity to hear at first hand what your colleagues are doing.

The day will include a panel discussion which with guests from a number of venues and companies, as well specialist insurance brokers Walton & Parkinson, on what can go wrong and how you can manage it. There will also be practical exercises and workshops presented by tourism specialist Mary Lynch of Mary Lynch Associates.

Email seamus@solttma.co.uk quoting that you are an ABO member to receive the cheaper TMA member rate.
 

Hot on the heels of the awarding of Bronze Charter Marks to the Royal Academy of Music last month we are delighted to announce another award. Many congratulations to the whole team at London Sinfonietta for their Bronze Award which was especially commended by the adjudicators.

In addition we are currently in the process of starting a full evaluation of the Charter as it nears the end of its first three year cycle. We are, as ever, extremely grateful to David Sulkin and Susan Dolton at the Musicians' Benevolent Fund who support this valuable work.

The next deadline for submissions is the end of this month so please get your applications into Keith by 5pm on Friday 23 October. As always, Keith is happy to discuss submissions in advance of the application - do email him or give him a call in the office.

Is further growth of the arts and cultural sector sustainable? Do we have too many buildings? Too many organisations? You are invited to join Mission Models Money and ERA21 to explore these important questions and share your views on whether the next decade needs a radically different approach in the light of the UK’s deficit, the global recession and the threat to our environment.

Steady State? is the first event of the Peer-to-Peer series - dedicated to some of the most urgent questions facing the arts & cultural sector in our times. The series is produced by Mission Models Money in partnership with ERA21 - visit the MMM site to keep up to date.
 

20 November 9am for 9.30am - 11.30am,

Gulbenkian Foundation, 50 Hoxton Square, London N1 6PB, http://mmm-steadystate-london.eventbrite.com

23 November 3pm for 3.30pm - 5.30pm, 

Dovecot Studios, 10 Infirmary Street, Edinburgh, EH1 1LT, http://mmm-steadystate-edinburgh.eventbrite.com

24 November 3pm for 3.30pm - 5.30pm,

Hoults Yard, Walker Road, Newcastle-upon-Tyne NE6 2HL, http://mmm-steadystate-newcastle.eventbrite.com/

‘Shaping the Future of Contemporary Music’
Glasgow, 29th October – 1st November 2009

A reminder that ARTMUSFAIR/2009 is open to representatives from the entire contemporary classical music scene and aims to attract some 500 composers, music publishers, record labels, musicians, promoters, managers and agents from across the European Community. Key objectives will be the building of new and closer partnerships, the exchange of new music ideas, and the sharing of the latest best-practice examples of innovation in the contemporary music world.

The four day event has been planned to coincide with celebrations of Scottish composer and Master of the Queen’s Music Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ 75th birthday. The programme will feature concerts by the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra as well as a number of performances of the very latest contemporary music by smaller Scottish, UK and European ensembles and by students from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. The programme will also include a number of project presentations and workshops on specific subjects, a late night concert lounge and various other live performances.

A major thrust of the conference programme is expected to be a series of high level seminars on public service broadcasting, the commissioning of music by orchestras and ensembles, arts funding and copyright. The aim is to stimulate an intensive and path-leading debate as a first step towards producing a "European Composers' Manifesto" for the future of contemporary music. There will also be a special ABO session, which will revisit our New Music Seminar held in 2004 and look at new music commissioning by British orchestras five years on. The session will be chaired by Susannah Simons and panelists include Sally Groves, Andrew Cornall, Andrew Burke, Gavin Reid, Vanessa Reed and Anna Meredith.
 

For further information click here.

Arts Council England has published the findings of the latest Taking Part briefing, which looks at arts engagement trends over the first three years of the survey from 2005/06 to 2007/08. Overall there hasn't been a great deal of change but there have been a few interesting developments.

Perhaps the most notable change has been in the North West, which experienced pretty substantial increases in both arts attendance and participation between 2006/7 and 2007/08. This is assumed to be due at least in part to the Liverpool Capital of Culture year, with the lead-up and launch of the celebrations taking place during the fieldwork period of the 2007/08 dataset.

Elsewhere engagement has been pretty stable, although there were declines in arts participation in both London and the North East. There have also been some changes in attendance and participation for individual artforms:

• significant increases in the proportion of people participating in dance and reading for pleasure
• increased attendance at the most popular arts events - musicals, pantomime and live music gigs, mostly rock and pop concerts
• slight decreases in attendance at classical music concerts and craft exhibitions
 

 The report can also be downloaded from http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/about-us/research/arts-audiences/taking-part-survey/  

The Hallé, RLPO, BBC Scottish SO and The Sixteen are winners at this year’s Gramophone Awards, along with the Royal Opera House which was awarded the Classic FM Innovation Award.

Click here for further details

Arts Council England has made the third and fourth rounds of awards from its £40 million Sustain fund for organisations under pressure as a result of the recession. Successful applicants include ABO members the Hallé Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Birmingham Royal Ballet, The English Concert, Manchester Camerata, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. Further details of the awards made and declined are published on the Arts Council England website here. The Sustain programme will close to new applications on 9 October.

Stirling 16 & 17 October 2009

The State Foundation for the National System of Youth and Children’s Orchestras of Venezuela (FESNOJIV) has transformed the lives of hundreds of thousand of children since 1975. It is perhaps better known throughout the world as “El Sistema.”

In summer 2008 this remarkable phenomenon reached the UK as the charity Sistema Scotland launched its Big Noise Orchestra in Raploch, Stirling - with the aim of repeating the Venezuelan success.

This international conference, to be held in the new state-of-the-art Raploch community and educational campus, offers a unique opportunity to hear from both Venezuelan teachers steeped in the history of El Sistema's development, and the teachers from its first UK orchestra.

Anyone interested in using music and the arts to bring about social change will find the event of interest.

Over the course of the two days we will focus on the philosophy of the Sistema approach, Big Noise’s work in practice, and the processes towards establishing a Sistema orchestra. Delegates will meet children and parents involved and observe the Big Noise orchestra at work and play. There will be an opportunity to network with like-minded people interested in using the arts to drive social change.

There are a maximum of 80 places available. Please book early to avoid disappointment. Places are for both days only and cost £60. A limited number of free places may be available.

To apply to attend (or for further information) contact admin@sistemascotland.org.uk
  

Recently opened for entries, the PRS Foundation’s New Music Award offers £50,000 to realise a ground-breaking musical idea.

Sally Taylor, their Chairman, said: "We are thrilled to launch the third New Music Award, which is set to be bigger and better than ever. It is an exceptional award which takes risks by encouraging creators to push the boundaries of their artistic practice and extend the possibilities of music regardless of which genre they work in. We really do encourage anyone with an inspired musical idea to apply."

The deadline for entries is Friday 8 January 2009. Click here to find out how to enter.
 

Asia-Europe Cultural Partnership Initiatives: Performing Arts

The Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF) presents its new scheme, the Asia-Europe Cultural Partnership Initiative: Performing Arts (AECPI: PA) as part of its plans to further enhance multilateral connections between Asia and Europe by developing and stimulating strategic initiatives with partners from the performing arts including but not limited to those in dance, theatre and music. ASEF will offer support ranging from 5,000EUR to 15,000EUR to organisations such as festivals, arts/cultural centres, performing arts venues and associations for partnership initiatives occurring from 1 Feb to 31 Dec 2010, with a clear Asia-Europe focus. ASEF aims to support partnership initiatives which will bring about more opportunities for networking, understanding and cooperation between the two regions amidst new challenges that the sector faces today. This will help further ASEF’s role as a key advocate for Asia-Europe dialogue and collaboration in the field of the performing arts.

Applications now open

Further details & instructions can be found at: http://www.asef.org/index.php?option=com_project&task=view&id=562

Deadline for application submission: 30 Nov 2009

In March 2010, applications to Grants for the Arts will begin to be managed from the Grants for the Arts centre in Manchester, and from 1 March 2010 applications can be submitted online. The new Grants for the Arts centre will be staffed by highly skilled arts specialists who have a strong knowledge of the arts and close relationships with regional offices.

Online applications are a major step forward in making Grants for the Arts more widely accessible and application as easy as possible. This will be a simple, user-friendly process that will help applicants complete the information we need. The online system will be launched in time for the first applications to be submitted online from 1 March 2010.

We are also simplifying the information we require for applications of £10,000 or less. Applicants will be asked for a shorter proposal which will mean that we can give them a decision in six weeks.

To ensure that the transition from one way of working to the other is as efficient and seamless as possible we will be suspending new applications to Grants for the Arts between Monday 18 January and Friday 26 February.

Decisions will continue to be made throughout the transition period and, so we can assess all applications in good time, applicants may want to submit earlier or later than they were planning to. Applicants for £10,000 or less may find it is better to submit their applications later and get a quicker decision using the online process.

More information about the improvements to Grants for the Arts is available at www.artscouncil.org.uk/grantsfortheartschanges.
 

A new initiative that will run throughout the 2009/10 academic year, was launched in September 2009 by Ed Balls, Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families. The ambition is to bring together and showcase the wide range of music-related experiences available to children and young people across England, and to encourage each one of them – whatever their talent – to get involved in music.

The Department for Children, Schools and Families, through its ongoing commitment to providing access to quality music and culture opportunities for children and young people, is committed to supporting music programmes including Sing Up, In Harmony and the Music Manifesto. The National Year of Music aims to celebrate the diverse opportunities available to children and young people across the country. For more information visit http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/tunein/  
 

This interactive initiative aims to raise money for children with cancer, by encouraging people to take part in a sponsored music practice or performance.

Anyone can take part, whatever style of music they are in to, no matter what their age, instrument or playing ability is. You can join in on your own, or with your band or group - the idea is simply to have fun making music, and to raise money for a good cause at the same time.

For more information and to sign up now go to www.clicsargent.org.uk/music  and play your part in raising money for children with cancer.

Imelda Dervin has joined the the Academy of St Martin in the Fields team as Interim General Manager.

Roanna Chandler will leave the Marketing team at Glyndebourne on 16 October to take up the position of Concerts Director at the London Philharmonic Orchestra on 26 October.