The National Concert Hall's Outreach department works with schools to make music accessible to the next generation, writes Christine Madden

After the boys' group have run through their rap chorus, Tim Steiner, the leader and animateur of the National Concert Hall's project "Music in the Docklands," stems his hands in his hips in mock exasperation. "What do you think of that, girls? Was that snappy enough?" A resounding "No!" issues from the female section of the chorus.

Ireland's next generation of would-be rappers, otherwise recognisable as the pupils of Star of the Sea boys' public school in Sandymount, shuffle their feet sheepishly but rise to the challenge. They put some wellie into the second round of their rap chorus, and this time it's sharp and funky.

Lucy Champion, the director of the Outreach department at the NCH, is constantly feeling out new opportunities such as this to put music in the vista of young people and bring them into the concert hall - in this case, the John Field Room. For many of the kids participating in "Music in the Docklands", it would be their first experience of the building. To have their parents attend a concert there, in which they perform music of their own devising, is an exciting, even awe-inspiring event for them and their families.

Supported by the Dublin Docklands Development Authority as part of its initiative to develop this part of the city, the "Music in the Docklands" programme continues this year.

The project, now in its third year, has been so successful that it won the Allianz Business2Arts Award for Best Business/Arts Collaboration in May 2004. Before the kids get into the NCH, however, the NCH comes to them.

That music is something the highbrow elite listen to in an ostentatious assembly room is a misconception that doesn't build audiences, nor does it enrich lives. Establishing a rapport between young people outside and musicians inside the NCH allows them to explore an art form with the potential to open communication between communities.

Fulfilling the concert hall's remit as a national institution, the Outreach department has travelled the country, bringing music and, more importantly, the practical experience to create it, to local schools. "We did 29 residencies in counties all over Ireland," says Champion. The regional project, "In Tune", sponsored by the ESB, assisted them in visiting different schools for about a week each month - work that has helped schools prepare for the new primary school music curriculum.

To facilitate the implementation of the new curriculum, the concert hall's Outreach department visited 150 schools between 1998 and 2002 and, based on their experiences, prepared a CD ROM and notes to assist teachers, particularly those with scant exposure to music and thus little confidence in teaching the subject. "We got a lot of panicked calls," recalls Champion. "It's like having a beautiful new car and not knowing how to drive it. Training is key."

Feedback that reached the Outreach department indicated the schools found the exercises and notes invaluable for instruction. "It was just taking the communication skills of teachers and applying them in music to their classes. The teachers realised, 'yeah, we can do this'."

The NCH supports music education in schools for secondary students, for example with its biannual performance and workshop events featuring the Royal Irish Academy Symphony Orchestra, which provides closer, more hands-on examination of the set pieces of that year's Leaving Certificate.

Over the past several years, extracurricular programmes previous to the "Music in the Docklands" have explored multi-faceted opportunities with young people and music, in addition to building a core musical workshop team with which the NCH can continue its programmes. "Exchanging Notes", for example, resulted from collaboration between the Outreach department and the education department of the Royal Festival Hall at the South Bank Centre in London. From September 2001 to May 2002, two schools in Dublin - Scoil Chaitríona CBS and City Quay Primary School were paired with St Stephen's CE School in Lambeth and St Andrew's CE School in Brixton - and two cultures mingled through music.

Taking on the theme "My Perfect World", so that "everything had to do with what they were living now", says Champion, the partnered schools undertook a communal project during which the students were in communication with each other, not only about the music but also about themselves.

Using Bartok's Microcosmos, they used some of its themes on which "to hang the main part of the musical composition". Steiner, who also led this project, composed a piece for all four schools to sing together, as schools on both sides crossed the Irish Sea for workshop and performance visits. "They also did video diaries," Champion elaborates. "It was a great learning curve for all of us."

Through the programmes such as these, NCH Outreach have also been able to assemble and train their teaching group. The programming activities dovetail with the need to provide additional sources of income for third-level music students.

DIT's music curriculum wisely provides its students with the opportunity to get involved in community projects and workshopping. "DIT have a scheme whereby you can get training on how to teach so you have other skills beyond performance," explains Champion. "As an element of the master's course, they can do education modules with the NCH in programmes such as 'Music in the Docklands'."

Brendan Walsh, a master's student in performance at DIT, elected to participate, and the experience was an eye-opener. "At the school in Sandymount, a lot of the kids were already taking music lessons, but the girls [at St Laurence O'Toole's school] had nothing, just a couple of recorders," he says.

Walsh had dealt with young kids and music before, but found Steiner's approach novel and interesting. "He spoke to kids like adults, and took in all their comments. I thought he would be more boisterous, but the kids could talk to him, and he would say 'no' if he didn't like an idea."

Steiner is once again leading the workshop process, this time with a mix of primary and secondary school students. Together with his team - Aingeala de Burca on violin, Susan Doyle on flute, Mary Curran on horn and Maul Maher doing percussion - he will lead pupils at Scoil Uí Chonaill, Dublin 1, and Westland Row CBS in composing their own music and lyrics. Beginning February 6th and 7th, the team will visit both schools to conduct a number of sessions interspersed through the otherwise grey final weeks of winter. Before they tackle the students, though, "we do a session with the teachers," explains Champion, "so they understand the language we're all speaking." The project will culminate in a final performance, this time on the main stage in the NCH on March 10th.

"It's a big thing for the kids to go out on the stage at the NCH," says Champion. And the excitement has lasting benefits for all involved. "Teachers gain the confidence and go on to teach music." And one of the previous participating schools, Larkin Community College, "has instigated a music programme on the strength of their experience, and even used the musicians independent of the project for a musical".

After three years and six sessions of "Music in the Docklands", Champion agrees the project provides a fine blueprint for further music education programmes throughout the country, whether through the NCH or not.

In the meantime, she has every intention of continuing to help children and their teachers and parents find an unthreatening path to the joys of making music. "I want to get the NCH out of Earlsfort Terrace and into these other areas," she says. "We learn as much from the students as they learn from the musicians."