Backstage to the Future is our flagship live skills training programme delivered with a youth focus. Building on the success of the first iteration in Rio as part of the 2016 Cultural Olympiad, we partnered with the Green Moon Festival (Colombia) and Rebel Salute (Jamaica) to run BTF Caribbean. We brought together 21 participants from Colombia, Venezuela, Jamaica, and Cuba to the islands of San Andres and Providencia (Colombia) and Jamaica for a jam-packed 15 day programme involving future live event producers and technicians, and an inspiring team of course leader, Derek Richards, and course trainers from the UK, Venezuela, and Jamaica, Steve Reece, Carlos Gutierrez, and Don McDowell.
The programme is designed to meet the demands we discovered through our research highlighting skills gaps, and focuses on two key areas – the technical skills needed to create and uphold the work, from lighting and sound engineering to stage management, and the soft skills to help people to share their vision and collaborate, from communication skills and planning, to team working. Our goal is to inspire knowledge sharing, grow cultural networks, increase employability of disadvantaged young people and and build capacity in the live events and performing arts infrastructure in country.
We partnered with the 30th anniversary of the Green Moon Festival (Colombia) and Rebel Salute Festival (Jamaica) to give the participants the opportunity to put their training into practice and get hands on experience of a real event setting.
Dedicated to the long lasting impact of Backstage to the Future, we have already started evaluating the programme. Our participants wanted to learn skills in stage management, sound engineering and lighting in particular, with ambitions to work more closely with projects at a local level.
Watch our films to learn more about how we met these expectations, read a Q & A with our director about the programme, read about the impact Backstage to the Future had on our fantastic participants, or why not venture back to find out about the first ever Backstage to the Future in Rio.