A NEW academy opening in Tavistock will offer youngsters with a passion for sound the opportunity to get together to make music.

Tavistock Music Academy, to be based at Tavistock College, aims to give children aged from seven to 18 the chance to be part of a number of musical groups, regardless of their musical ability.

Funded by the Tavistock Learning Community, the academy will host five ensembles orchestra, jazz band, percussion, choir and guitars, of which children can join one or two.

Director of the academy Debbie Randles said: It will give some of the small schools a chance to play in big ensembles.

Our aim is to provide a happy, inspiring environment in which all children are able to share in the process of music making.

In the short term we want to provide performance opportunities for the kids, hopefully one each term, and in the long term we hope to raise the standards of the academy so the children can go on to do high level stuff.

Above all we want our students to love music as much as we do.

Three teachers will be running the academy, with Debbie Randles teaching orchestra and percussion and David Gray, who works in schools around Tavistock, teaching guitar and the jazz band. The third teacher has not yet been confirmed.

Debbie said: Were welcoming anybody to the academy, no experience is needed except for the jazz band where students need to be able to play an instrument and bring their own with them.

But for percussion and choir anybody can come along.

Debbie said the academy has also just bought 30 ukuleles: A lot of primary schools are doing ukulele lessons now and we thought it would be a nice thing to do as kind of a stepping stone up to playing the guitar, as most of the chords follow the same shape.

The academy will run on Friday afternoons from 4pm to 6.30pm starting on September 24.

The first term will be free, and the academy hopes to only charge a small amount after that.

Debbie said: We want everyone to get involved, we dont want money to be a barrier.

Im very excited about the academy. Its quite an unusual thing to do and Ive been given the opportunity to develop it how I want to. Im hoping its going to be a really big thing.

A website for the academy is currently under construction at http://www.tavistockmusicacademy.co.uk">www.tavistockmusicacademy.co.uk and should be running by the end of August.

Anyone interested in joining the academy can email Debbie at [email protected]">[email protected]