☆ Successful Artist Support Programme running 6+ Yrs

☆ 60+ Yorkshire Artists Intensively Supported for a Full Year

☆ Holistic Model: Recordings, Releases, Festival Gigs, Radio & Mentoring

☆ Artists Secured: Record Deals, Funding, Media Acclaim, Major Appearances

☆ Unique Programme: Entire Music & Radio Industries In-House

Breakthrough, our artist development programme for emerging music artists from the Yorkshire region is in its 7th year

Originally funded by Help Musicians UK with match funding from Arts Council England Breakthrough, is our intensive, 1 year artist development programme. It has supported some of Yorkshire’s most talented original music artists (of many diverse genres) to grow sustainable music careers.

Breakthrough provides free expert support which includes recording, live festival showcases, music releases, master-classes, radio sessions and professional mentoring, supporting the artists selected for the programme, intensively over a full year.

How Breakthrough works

To select artists, we run annual calls, working with industry experts from festivals, radio, record labels and management. We score submissions under: musicianship, professional / online presence, and overall impact, also considering which artists would benefit most from the support.

Mentoring is a valuable aspect of the programme, but talking invariably also leads to a need for ‘doing’… and because Higher Rhythm is unique regionally, offering the entire music & radio industries in-house, we can then provide ‘direct’ solutions to any artist’s identified needs. This involves free access to our own recording studios, radio station, record label, distribution and event promotions.

Successes for artists

To date, we have supported more than 60 regional artists involved in Breakthrough to achieve successes such as:

Playing at festivals (such as BBC 1xtra, Tramlines, Live at Leeds, Long Division, Liverpool Sound City )

Gaining regional and national BBC radio play and media acclaim

Increasing income from releasing music worldwide

Building revenue from royalties and securing investment

Developing the business skills needed to be a sustainable artist

We also work with artists to better understand the financial / wider implications of artistic activities. This covers areas such as touring, releasing, marketing / PR, record deals and taxation. Additionally, we support artists to build skills around managing investment, including securing grant funding. The music business support received through Breakthrough enables musicians to operate as more effective industry professionals and micro enterprises.

Who’s benefitted?

Breakthrough has been a diverse programme. To date, 53% of participants were aged 18-24 and 47% were 25-35. Artists identified 50% male, 48% female and 2% other, also including 12% black and ethnic minority artists.

Breakthrough is a truly inclusive programme and we strongly believe that place shouldn’t be a barrier to accessing the music industry. Breakthrough therefore levels the playing-field with 53% of artists coming from towns and villages, alongside 47% from cities / cultural-industry hot-spots.

More good results

The Association of Independent Music (AIM) provide free memberships for artists on the Breakthrough programme each year. This means artists can benefit even further from training, expert advice, networking and exclusive opportunities.

We’ve published some free tools for music artists produced as a result of direct feedback at Breakthrough music industry panel events held in Leeds, Sheffield, Hull and Scunthorpe.

Breakthrough has also featured in UK Music reports and Parliamentary debate, praised by Louise Haigh MP, discussing the work of Higher Rhythm, who described the programme as a “regional asset, which helps artists tangibly progress in their careers”.

Below are a few of the artists supported through Breakthrough: