MAY
2025

News

Carlton Lanes Concert

Once again, our annual presentation concert will take place at Carlton Lanes Shopping Centre on Friday 13th June, from 7pm. We're very lucky to have exclusive access to the shopping centre for our concert, and would like to thank management once again.

Tickets for the event are available on the link below, priced at just £6 for adults, with kids going free. The ticket price includes a glass of proscecco (adults only!) or soft drink.

Book now

Numbers are limited, so please don't leave it long to book yours if you want to be there! As with our last concert, all monies raised will go towards subsidising the Isle of Man trip costs for our members, so we thank you in advance for your generosity.

We hope to see you there!

 

 

Isle of Man Fundraising Concert

CYM are very excited to announce plans for a concert trip to the Isle of Man in July this year.

To make this as affordable as possible for our members, we hosted a fundraising concert at St Joseph's RC Church Hall, Castleford on Friday 4th April, to help us subsidise the cost. The free concert featured a wide range of music from our Concert Band and Choir, and our generous audience helped us raise over £350 towards funding the trip, via a raffle, tombola and retiring collection.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Concert Programme 2025

As usual, we're now taking a couple of months off from performing while we prepare a selection of new music for our 2025 Concert Series. Keep checking our events page for details of our forthcoming performances as soon as they're available

Open Letter - Closure of Castleford Civic Centre

Following the recent (unannounced) decision by Wakefield Council to close Castleford Civic Centre in October this year, we have written an open letter to the leader of Wakefield Council expressing our sadness and concern regarding the impact this will have on groups like ours. Although we don't expect it to make much of a difference in terms of the decision to close the Centre, we don't want history to record that there were no objections.

Click here to read the letter

Many thanks to the other local groups who offered their names as signatories to this letter; Encore Theatre Company, Castleford Male Voice Choir, Company A Theatre, Castleford Singers, and Pauline Quirke Academy, Wakefield.

We'd love to hear your views regarding the closure of the Centre. If you'd like to leave a comment, you can do so by clicking here.

Leave us a Review!

If you're a member, past member, a patron or have attended one of our concerts recently, you can make a massive difference to us by spending just a minute or two leaving us a Facebook and Google review. Even choosing the 5 stars option without leaving a comment will make a big difference to our group, increasing our profile online and helping us attract new members. Please click the links below, thank you!

FBReview Googlereview

 

Musical Youth International

Musical Youth International (MYI) were a Michigan based performance organization who took large numbers of music students on elaborate overseas tours during the 1960s, 70s and 80s. In 1966, they paid a visit to Castleford as part of their European tour and performed a concert on 7th July at the Girls Modern. It was during a post-concert reception at the neighbouring Boys Modern that the idea to form Castleford Young Musicians came about.

MYI alumni Jim Roth, has been collating vast amounts of information relating to MYI and has produced a very detailed file of the 1966 tour. The full document, plus extracts relating to the visit to Castleford can be found by clicking the links below. A big thank you to Mr Roth for his time and effort putting this together.

Full Document (17Mb)

Extracted Document (950Kb)

Our Choir Members Don't Just Sing...!!

A big thank you to Choir member Jacob (aged 9) who has used ChatGPT to create a poem to advertise our group.

We love that he enjoys being part of CYM enough to put something like this together...why not join him and the rest of us on a Friday evening - we're always happy to welcome new members to our Choir and Concert Band.

Click the our logo on the right to read the poem in full...

 

 

We are recruiting!

We are currently recruiting singers and wind instrumentalists of any age to come and join the choir and band. If you are interested, we'd love to see you at one of our rehearsals (either to take part, or just sit and listen!) We rehearse every Friday evening (excluding school holidays and concert nights) at St Joseph's Primary School in Castleford, from 7:15pm.

For more information, please watch our promo video or contact us for more details. There's never been a better time to join!

 

 

 

Our Year 2024

Representatives from CYM were in attendance at the launch event for Wakefield Council's 'Our Year 2024' campaign recently. We're looking forward to being involved in promoting the vast range of creative arts available in the Wakefield District throughout 2024. Look out for more information soon. Further details can be found on the following link: https://experiencewakefield.co.uk/our-year-2024/

 

 

CYM

Older News

Colours of the Wind - Virtual Performance

Not to be outdone by the band, some of our choir members have been busy creating a virtual performance of their own, recording their parts for 'Colours of the Wind'. A big thank you and well done to you all, and to Sarah Clarkson once again for putting them all together. You can watch both videos here.

 

A Thousand Years - Virtual Performance

As well as attempting the CYM Ultimate Quiz (see below) some of our band members have been busy creating a virtual performance of 'A Thousand Years'. A big thank you to everyone who took part and to Sarah Clarkson for putting all the videos together. You can watch the video here. Not to be outdone, the choir are currently attempting a similar performance of 'Colours of the Wind'. Check back here soon to see the result!

 

CYM Ultimate Quiz

The CYM Ultimate Quiz has been created for a little bit of light entertainment while we're in lockdown during the coronavirus pandemic. Although it's primarily aimed at our current membership, there are some questions that may be easier for past members, and we'd love to hear how our friends and supporters do too! Click here to have a go!

 

Children's University

CYM are now a registered Learning Destination with the Children's University, so our younger members can earn hours for their Passports to Learning by taking part in rehearsals and concerts. We are also more than happy to invite new members who may be part of the Children's University and want to fill their passports! For more information about the Children's University, visit their website www.childrensuniversity.co.uk

Help us Spread the Word!

Social media is one of the cheapest, easiest and most effective methods of promotion available to us, but we need your support! Please like and share our pages and posts on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to help spread the word! Why not keep up to date with all the CYM news and events by joining our mailing list too?! Click here to sign up.

 

 

 

 

Become a Friend of CYM

Our annual patron's scheme 'Friends of CYM' is a great way to support Castleford Young Musicians if you're not musical or you fall outside our membership age range! Memberships are just £12 (single) and £15 (joint) for 12 months.

This is an excellent way to help CYM with their fundraising efforts - if you're interested please complete the form on our Friends page. Contact us if you would like more information.

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