Budding musical directors invited to join free mentorship scheme

Set to last nine months, the mentorship programme provides participants with monthly one-to-one mentorship from a professional musical director, starting from August.

The Musical Director Mentorship Scheme has been set up by directors who have worked on the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Matilda, Tina: The Tina Turner Musical, Six and The Book of Mormon.

Organisers include directors Katy Richardson, Sean Green, Tom Kelly, Ron Crocker, Amy Shackcloth, Katharine Woolley, Nick Skilbeck and composer, orchestrator and music supervisor Martin Lowe.

Applications are still open, and the scheme is particularly seeking applicants who may have experienced barriers in their careers due to their ethnicity or race, as well as those from marginalised and under-represented genders.

Alongside the founders, mentors also include Nick Finlow, Toby Higgins, Mark Crossland, Jim Henson, Mark Dickman, Phil Bateman and Cathy Jayes.

Katy Richardson said: ‘The Musical Director Mentorship Scheme is important because we hope it will open the door for a new generation of musical directors, who are starting out and/or looking to improve their skill set and make some connections, in what has in the past been a tricky field to get into’

‘It is completely free of charge on a voluntary basis, and we are really looking forward to finding some new talent that we can help get their start in a career that we love so much.’

The free scheme is available to creatives in the UK over the age of 18, and the deadline for applications is 31 May.

The application form is available here.