The Youth Music Initiative (YMI) launched the Demo Fund in January 2009 for Scotland’s recording studios to engage with young musicians and bands of all genres of music to work in a professional recording studio for the first time.

The Fund has enabled Watercolour Music to work with a number of emerging musicians, providing a unique opportunity to work with a professional producer and to leave the studio with recordings they are proud to submit to record labels, radio stations and promoters.

Nick Turner, resident producer at the newly relocated Ardgour-based studio, said, “We’re really looking forward to providing young artists with the ultimate professional experience.  We want to allow them time and space to develop their writing and arranging skills, and to appreciate the journey they and their music can take from its inception to the finished article ”.

To reflect the scheme’s new focus on communities, Watercolour Music is casting its net right across the Highlands and Islands, and appealing for submissions from bands and musicians right across the region.

Submitting artists have to be under 25 years old, unsigned to any label or management and not have participated in any international showcase.

Contact: Nick Turner, Watercolour Music, Ardgour PH33 7AH
Email: nick@watercolourmusic.co.uk

Deadline for submissions: December 20th 2011

“Nick is a master at what he does. He quickly understands the music and what the band are looking for and seamlessly gets into the mindset of the band; it was as though he’d been producing us for years. It was a delight and our pleasure to work with such an experienced engineer and producer, not to forget the general banter and often hilarious tales of misfortune”. Kotchka