Welcome to Giant Steps Home Page

SWAMP
Click the link on the left for a report on our recent exciting schools collaboration.

GIANT STEPS
A music education project run by Derby Jazz in partnership with Youth Music, and with support from Chas Foulds and Son, Derby City Council, Friends of Derby Jazz, University of Derby, Derby College, Arts Council England and East Midlands Jazz.

Last year's GIANT STEPS JAZZ PARTY was a huge success and a great way to celebrate everything our students have achieved (see the 'Gallery' link on the left). It gave us an opportunity to showcase GIANT STEPS to some important decision makers from:

  • Arts Council England
  • Youth Music
  • Derby and Derbyshire Education Services
  • Jazz Services (a national agency for Jazz development
  • Creative Partnership
All were enormously impressed with the quality and diversity of the music played and with the self-confidence with which our students performed.

YOUTH MUSIC have allowed us to extend GIANT STEPS to include this term's Saturday Jazz School and Creative Percussion Discussion and a Summer School in July.  They haven't actually given us any more money, but they are letting us spread the £57,000 awarded in June 2004 to cover a longer period than originally planned.

We are still looking for funding to support GIANT STEPS beyond summer 2006.  Any sponsors out there?  Please get in touch -
Contact Geoff:  geoffw@breathe.com  or phone 01332 606320

We launched GIANT STEPS in August 2004 and by the end of March 2006 it has involved over 300 young people in:

  • More than 270 workshops with our regular tutors: Jon Eno, David Eno, Lauren Hogg, John Bailey, Walt Shaw and Oli Matthews.
  • Over 50 workshops with major jazz artists, including: Alex Wilson, Andy Panayi, Andy Scott, Bruce Adams, Claude Deppa, Corey Mwamba, Hilary Cameron, Mark Armstrong, Pete Long, Tina May, Tony Kofi and Zigashane Ntalemawa.
  • Performances at Derby Assembly Rooms, Derby Dance Centre, Derby Guildhall Theatre, Metro Cinema, Rolls Royce Pavilion, The Voicebox and several Derby schools.
  • Two four day Summer Schools.
  • Five terms of Saturday School.
  • Five terms of Creative Percussion Discussion.
  • Jazz workshops with Voices choir at Voicebox.
  • Outreach workshops in schools.
We have also supported the professional development of our own tutors, school-teachers and undergraduates. All GIANT STEPS workshops involve improvisation and expect high levels of creativity and application from their participants. The two words our young musicians use most frequently to describe what they do in GIANT STEPS are 'challenging' and 'fun'.

Click on links for details of last year's:  Saturday School,
Percussion Workshop,  Summer School  and  Swamp Project.