Future Yard expands it music accelerator programme to support more new talent across Liverpool City Region

As well as its incredible live music calendar, Future Yard in Birkenhead also runs a free to access Propeller programme that has been providing mentorship and support to Liverpool City Region music creators since 2021.

Thanks to recent funding partnerships with Wirral Council and PRS Foundation, the Futura Yard Propeller programme has grown significantly with additional creative and business support to help more and more artists and bands in our region become the best versions of themselves.

It has never been easier for musicians to release music, but with this comes increasing challenges to cut through the noise so they can build an audience, a business, a team and a living. With industry investment arriving later and later, it is fundamental that an artist/band can grow themselves to a level that managers, agents, record labels and publishers can then amplify. This requires the need for modern music creators to build their own toolbox to help grow their projects themselves.

Propeller is designed to fill up this toolbox and provide music creators with support on how best to use its contents. Propeller sits at the heart of the artist empowerment revolution, working with early career and established music creators with huge potential. There are many workshops and sessions that are open access with no sign up required, but becoming a member comes with many benefits, including 1-2-1 mentorship, funding application support, opportunities to promote their own show at Future Yard, and further bonuses such as free gig tickets and rehearsal bursaries.

Future Yard’s Head of Talent Development, Cath Hurley, explains:

“We’ve designed Propeller so that those that need support have a clear choice of what to engage with. They might be at a point where they are quite happy to dip their toe in and attend a couple of workshops that are useful at that very moment in time, or they could be catching up with a mentor once a week to help push them through an EP release, promotion of a local headline show, or even just a bit of validation that their project/career is heading in the right direction.

We believe that music creators at all levels should be able to access support that is relevant for them, so we need to ensure that our Propeller community are provided for no matter if they are creating music for fun or pursuing a career. It’s really about doing what you want to do in the best way you can do it. Performing at Open Mic may result in joining our regular songwriting programme, attending workshops on business set-up or basic legals may prevent future difficulties, or having a development plan and a mentor can then provide further direction and accountability. Workshops are often created based on our members telling us what they need, so as much as we’ve created an in-depth programme of activity, we are also super reactive and can build sessions based on requests.

In short, there’s an element of ‘pick your own adventure’ about our Propeller programme.”

Dedicated business support is provided thanks to the UK Government’s Shared Prosperity Fund with the Liverpool City Region in partnership with Wirral Council. This will see music creators across Liverpool City Region supported with developing their projects into businesses, whether that’s solo artists as sole traders, or bands as partnerships. This part of the programme goes deep into the patchwork of ways that music creates revenue, ensuring all avenues are considered. Additional support comes from PRS Foundation’s Talent Development Network, putting Future Yard in amongst the UK’s leading organisations in this field. This ensures there is a strong focus on the creation of exceptional music, which will be showcased regularly on Future Yard’s stage.

As part of this ramp up of activity on the Propeller programme, Future Yard will host a two-day music business conference for local artists and bands. BEACON will take place across the 9^th and 10^th of January, bringing some very special industry guests to Birkenhead to help our Propeller community put their best foot forward into 2025. More information on this will follow shortly.

Further info and short application form: Propeller.futureyard.org/apply

Open access programme (more visible to signed-in members): Propeller.futureyard.org/programme

Get the latest music news for Liverpool City Region HERE.