Children have been let down over music, say leading musicians

The Government has broken its promise to give every child in Britain the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, according to leading figures in the music industry.

Julian Lloyd Webber, Sting, Alison Balsom and the heads of the Royal College of Music and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra are among the signatories to a letter demanding that all children have a chance to play.

They want Ofsted rules to be changed so that a school cannot be rated ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ unless it offers good or outstanding music provision.

The Government unveiled its National Plan for Music in 2011 with great fanfare, claiming it would “enable every child to have the chance to learn to play a musical instrument for at least a term, ideally a year”.

However, the funding model is a postcode lottery and access to instruments is “simply out of reach” for a great number of children, said James Rhodes, the concert pianist and lead signatory to the letter published in today’s Telegraph.

Read more on the Telegraph website