On Wednesday morning I joined other figures from the arts world to hear Maria Miller’s first big speech as Culture Secretary, at the British Museum. 48 hours on, I’ve talked at length with lots of people, sometimes even quite sensibly, and have constructed a short, reasonably coherent response to it, which I’m sure I will […]Read More

On Monday 29 April hundreds of artists and artistic directors, producers and promoters, curators and composers will gather at the What Next? national conference at the Palace Theatre in London. Our purpose? (For I’ll be there, and I hope you will be too.) To explore how the cultural sector can harness ‘people power’. How, collectively, […]Read More

New Music Plus…UK is a two year, nationwide, creative and professional development programme developed and delivered by PRS for Music Foundation and the hub. NMP… supports the professional development of independent music producers and helps arts organisations to strengthen their approach to programming new music. As well as providing the producers with mentoring, training and […]Read More

On Tuesday 26 and Wednesday 27 February all 12 New Music Plus…UK producers came together for a 2 days of practical training sessions at The MAC in Belfast, one of the host organisations taking part in New Music Plus… UK, the professional development programme developed in partnership by PRS for Music Foundation and the hub. […]Read More

Hub Associate Matthew Linley recently attended RE:SYSTEMS seminar on mobile technologies as the guest of Howard Monk of the local . The invite came about after Howard and Hub Director Julia Payne were chewing the digital cud as part of work the hub is doing on the market development of Gigzine (thanks Howard!). The key […]Read More

For one weekend each year the Digbeth arches in Birmingham vibrate with strange, wonderful sounds as the Custard Factory becomes the focal point for one of the UK’s most distinctive and respected music festivals…Supersonic Festival. A dynamic and constantly challenging experimental multi disciplinary arts festival, Supersonic identifies the otherwise indescribable connections between contemporary music, art, […]Read More

In these straitened times, everyone suddenly wants to collaborate. For independent music producers though, collaboration has long been a way of life, and a way of making great work. In this blog, recently published by Guardian Culture Professionals, hub director Julia Payne explores how collaborations with these independents can benefit established arts organisations. In music, […]Read More

For the last few months, it’s all been about happiness within the hub team, as we worked hard to programme this year’s INTERROGATE! festival at Dartington, which took place earlier this month. I’m not sure that ‘festival’ is the right noun for INTERROGATE!, including as it does a punch packing programme of performances, panel discussions, […]Read More

“NMP… was blue sky thinking made real.” (NMP… host organisation) In 2009, the hub joined forces with the PRS for Music Foundation to initiate New Music Plus…, a development programme which aimed to strengthen leadership skills and cross art-form learning amongst organisations and independent producers keen to develop their approach to programming and building new […]Read More

In last week’s budget, Chancellor George Osborne announced changes to the amounts of tax relief individuals will be able to claim that are almost certain to hit big gift donations to the arts sector, as well as the wider charitable sector. In his budget statement the Chancellor said, “From next year, anyone seeking to claim […]Read More