Bridging cash gap for music lessons
Group aim to raise £1k through abseil effort
Perth and Kinross Music Foundation is hoping to raise £1000 as supporters prepare to abseil from the Forth Rail Bridge later this month.
A group of ten, including the foundation’s chairman Mhairi McKinnon and percussion teacher Lynsey Paterson, will scale the 165m drop to help pay for children’s music lessons and participation in orchestras in the area.
The idea came from chair Mhairi McKinnon, who has been wanting to do an abseil for a few years, and was able to round up a team to take on the descent on Sunday, May 28.
She said: “It is the foundation’s 20th anniversary this year, and we help finance musicians whose parents can’t afford music lessons.
“Perth and Kinross Council started to charge significantly more for music lessons back in 1997, so now people apply to the foundation if their children are keen to play music but they can’t afford it.
“We help roughly 75 applicants a year, and we try to raise £12,000 every year. We do a lot of the fundraising ourselves, but we do get grants from the Gannochy Trust and other people make personal donations annually, but we do the bulk of it ourselves.”
Speaking of the leap into the unknown, she said: “I saw this chance to do an abseil, and I have
The music foundation hosts several fundraising events to ensure others have the chance to enjoy lessons always wanted to do it. I am doing it with nine others, four of whom are music teachers.
“We are hoping to raise £1000 from the group’s abseil. No one has ever done anything so nuts before to raise money for the music foundation, but it is going to be really fun, I am really looking forward to it.
“I am not nervous at all. I watched a friend doing it two years ago and she was petrified, she screamed the whole way down! But as I watched her I really wanted to do it myself. I applied to do it last year but I didn’t get in, so I was determined to get a place to do it this year to help contribute towards paying for children’s music lessons and central groups in Perth and Kinross.
“Our motto at the music foundation is ‘letting children play,’ and I am very passionate about it because I came up through the system myself and went on to have a career as a musician. You don’t have to end up doing music as a career, but it is so beneficial to the children in so many different ways. There are so many skills children can learn just from making music.”
Mhairi will be joined on the day by her colleagues Scott Barker, Tim Mitchell, Lynsey Paterson and Iona Crosby, who will also take on the abseil challenge.
To donate to Perth and Kinross Music Foundation’s efforts, visit the JustGiving page, www. justgiving.com/fundraising/ Mhairi-MacKinnon1, or www. justgiving.com/fundraising/ Lynsey-Paterson3.