^{Working towards a fairer music industry}

Route x Waltham Forest Young Creators Programme

2023/24

The cost of living crisis, alongside perpetual cuts in Arts funding and education has made the pursuit of a music career a seemingly impossible ambition for many young people across the UK. This is occurring in an already unbalanced industry landscape. UK Music’s 2024 Diversity Report shows just 20.9% of industry workers come from low economic or working class backgrounds. Working with Waltham Forest Council on the Young Creators Programme, Route and our programming agency partners LNZRT have begun to approach the difficult task of removing ever increasing barriers to access for under 30s living in the borough.

The State Of Play In Waltham Forest

The DK-CM 'Culture & Creativity in Walthamstow Study' in 2023 found that one of most significant gaps in the local cultural offer is places to experience live music. By building relationships across the borough over a period of 9 months we founds a strong community of grassroots performers, label owners, studio heads, venues and other creatives with the knowledge, passion and experience to establish a local ecosystem capable of supporting pathways into the industry. However, many of these businesses are cut off from some of the more established parts of the industry, meaning many excellent projects are operating in silos.

Throughout the programme we used our knowledge of working with young people from marginalised backgrounds along with our connections to the mainstream industry to bolster what the borough has to offer and bring these communities in closer contact with one another. Most importantly, the Young Creators Programme allowed us to provide tangible pathways for a cohort of young people based in the borough through real life work placements paid at the London Living Wage. Alongside local partners we created a new music brand, curated workshops with award winning designers, facilitated connections and supported local talent. Whether that be providing Ben Spence’s Fuzzbrain Studios the opportunity to showcase artists, supporting the return of Shake The High Road or curating a hometown show for Mercury Prize nominated musician Danalogue (The Comet Is Coming).

In Numbers

3.2k Audiences Engaged
23 Young People Employed
304 Hours of Employment & Training 10 Local Artists 6 Local Delivery Partners 82% Recruits From The Global Majority 22% Recruits With A Disabiltiy 9 Local Venues Activated 100% Free To Attend £3.1K Reinvested Into Local Supply Chains 28 Hours Of Further Employment Delivered

In Words

“I think giving people like myself opportunities to try new things and enjoy them, exposing local talent and giving them a platform to speak and perform, giving local businesses a platform to share what they do and promote an essence of creating full circle moments by giving back to the community are things not many organisations are doing so Route/LNZRT are creating an impactful change by doing this”

- Luke Doyley - Young Creators Programme Participant

“The area has always had a strong music culture but this has sometimes, existed in isolated pockets whereas having The Route and LNZRT work so publicly in the area has brought considerable amounts of exposure to these pockets and expanded the potential audiences.”

- Ben Spence, Fuzzbrain Studios, Young Creators Programme Partner
All in all, Uplands has been a positive example of what a community-led answer to music’s diversity and inclusion problems should look like. In a way, the day has been an illustration of how we should be attempting to revitalise and maintain DIY music in a microcosm, creating platforms for all, access to everyone and connections between grassroots creativity and commercial viability.

- Loud And Quiet

Read the impact report in full

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