Update: Youth event flops again

3:13pm Tuesday 13th May 2008

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A FRIDAY night gig for teenagers, organised by Witney Town Council has flopped for the second time.

Only two young people turned up at the town's Langdale Hall, outnumbered by the musicians playing on stage, and the plug was pulled on the event after two hours.

The flop last Friday evening follows a disaster with the first one in early April, which had to be cancelled because of a clash with a Friday night disco at the town's youth centre.

Town councillor Chrissie Curry devised the gigs during her term as mayor, in response to claims that there was not much going on in Witney for teenagers.

She this week admitted there had been some mistakes in organisation, but is determined to press ahead. She told the Gazette: "We now have a youth council set up, and will be using them to get the word spread about what we are putting on for kids in the town. Ideally, that should have been in place before we went ahead with the gigs. But we sent out 20 posters to each of the secondary schools. I'm now told by some teenagers at Henry Box School that they never saw them, so maybe they were put in the wrong places."

On Friday, the bands, Peppermint Vandals and Callum, all from the town's Henry Box School, were playing for free. It started at 7.30pm, but was abandoned at 9.30pm.

The gigs are aimed at 14- to 18-year-olds, with tickets costing £5 a head, and, despite the failure of the first two, Ms Curry is pressing ahead with a third one in July, before the end of school term.

There is no impact on the public purse, because Ms Currie is paying for the hire of the hall - £140 - herself. The bands play for free, and the ticket money is pooled by the council into future youth projects.

Jude Levermore, leader at Base 33 youth centre, said: "You can't make excuses as to why people didn't turn up. None of them from here went. With teenagers it is all about relationship. If your mates are going, you will go, it is about word of mouth. We now have a teenager on the youth council, and so there will be more involvement in the organisation."

Tickets for last Friday's gig were available in advance at Music Stand, Rapture, the town hall, and Corn Exchange office - the event was also given advance publicity in the Gazette and on its website.

The future running of the gigs is to be reviewed. The town council's public halls committee and newly-formed town youth council will have the future of the events on their agendas at meetings this week.

Comments posted on the Gazette website since Friday show a mixed reaction. Becky, of Witney, wrote: "I live in Witney, and I have seen no publicity about this event at all, anywhere around the town."

Pete, a local musician, wrote: "If you want youths to go to gigs 'to get them off the streets' then you need to get them to organise their own gigs . . ."

Dan, from Oxford, wrote: "Hopefully some of the more positive local teenagers can get involved in the planning, but I don't think the tax-funded council should worry too much about whether putting on something is 'patronising' or not."

Ms Curry, who was at the gig on Friday, added: "It was such a shame. They were really fabulous bands, and I would have thought some of their schoolmates would have come along to support them. But I'm not downhearted. We will continue to try and get this thing going."