Dear Nicky Morgan…

14th November 2014 Dear Nicky Morgan,
Wow recently you said choosing arts subjects held back children’s career opportunities. I am shocked. Yesterday I travelled to North Acton. There in a huge industrial building I stood before thousands of guitars, drums, trumpets, violins, cellos and other assorted instruments. They were piled up. Some had been played and loved and others seemed brand new. A small army of volunteers were mending and restringing instruments. This project ‘Don’t Stop the Music’ inspired and organised by the amazing pianist James Rhodes has been realized to help fill the gap left by successive governments’ unfilled promises to address music education properly and offer every child the real opportunity of learning an instrument.

The task is huge. So many mute instruments piled up. Case upon case boxed in bubblewrap indicate huge numbers of people who have donated these instruments are passionate about musical knowledge. I was moved. These instruments are a gift of human potential from one generation to the next generation. Music and the arts reveal to us the past, past extraordinary complexity and endeavour, but also point to hope for the future. Musical instruments are tools of hope in that process. Will you join James Rhodes and the 1000’s of people concerned with current education policy and realize schools are so much more than places for studying a limited lunchtime menu of subjects aimed at the job market. Schools are sources of inspiration for a rich and fulfilled life.
Bob and Roberta Smith.