A decade ago when Sound launched it was a place where under 18s could listen to live music.
It quickly evolved as young people took to the stage and its role also grew to mentoring those taking their opening steps in the industry.
From the Fermain Tavern it moved to St James, but the frequency of events dropped because of the centre’s other commitments.
It never had a permanent space to call home. But, that is all changing with The Pit.
“We always wanted to get it to address that demand for a place where the kids could come and hang out, meet like minded people, express themselves artistically, whether that’s music or learning how to run a show or learning how to operate light and sound systems or whatever else,” said Jon Bisson, who founded Sound alongside his wife Ani, and is currently St James Director.
When the Guernsey Tapestry moved to Castle Cornet it opened up rooms on the bottom floor of St James which have now been transformed.
“From this point on, it is very much to do with what we can provide the kids, allowing them to come here straight after school, stay here till six o’clock at night.
“We’ve got the studio, we’ve got practice space, we’ve got qualified mentors who can teach them. That’s the core of it. I don’t think people respond well to too much framework.
“They should walk in and go, ‘I’m interested in learning more about guitar. I would like to understand sound systems’.
“And what’s really fun is that almost all of the people supporting the project, both with their time as mentors and technically, are ex Sound kids who are now 22/23 years old, who were there 10 years ago, attending, becoming bands, performing, and now a lot of them are music teachers on the island, or they are working in the artistic sector.”
The sense is that the project will evolve and be driven by what young people want, not what the adults think they should do.
“What we spotted particularly was they’d see some young people playing music on stage, and their knee jerk reaction was, ‘I want to be on stage’. And then that was very much the catalyst for them to pick up an instrument or try vocals. And you have to be there at that moment and go, ‘right, here’s a microphone or here’s a guitar and an amplifier and no one’s going to tell you you’re wrong. Just get on and crack on’.
“I took two young people to a fundraising meeting with deputies recently, and there was much confusion among the deputies asking ‘what are these guys doing here?’ I said, ‘well, part of running a venue is fundraising, so they need to know how to do it’.
“And so every facet of what we do in the building, they can learn.”
If the main space at St James are slightly precious, The Pit is made to be a bit tougher.
“If something gets knocked around, it just doesn’t matter. We can wipe it down and go again.”
Samsung/JBL has supplied sound systems and supported with lights and sound.
The skills learnt at Sound on the equipment are fully transferable to the larger spaces upstairs.
“To be a mentor here, you have to be a participating musician, a live musician who goes out and performs, and you have to have performed in front of the young people who know you. They respect that, and they see that someone’s doing the job that they aspire to. You can’t be someone who just sits back.”
Authenticity was vital, he said.
Getting financial support for the project is made harder by there being no curriculum to point to.
You can plan to an extent, but nobody really knows what will happen.
What Sound has already done is act as a stepping stone into the creative sector.
“Say they learn about posters or how to make a website to support an event. Well, we’ve got the creative businesses on the island screaming for young junior designers. The businesses that do marquees, PAs and weddings are all screaming for people to go work for them.
“There are direct job opportunities. And if we give them that path and teach them the right way to do things so that their approach and their mentality and their expectations are correct, then they’ll walk in being really great employees, really great people within the community.”
Starting after the Easter holidays Sound will be open for 11- to 17-year-olds on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays after school, from 3pm – 6pm.
