The School Band

Festival director Guido de Groot shares the story behind the schools project, which has now become an essential part of Rotterdam Bluegrass Festival:

"In 2009, I started organizing the Rotterdam Bluegrass Festival at Pijnackerplein. During the week, the square was used as a playground by a primary school, and on weekends it was full of local kids playing and kicking a ball around. So when you suddenly fill that square with stages, it can feel like you're taking away their space. And rightly so - there’s not a lot of open space to play in Rotterdam’s Old North.

That’s why I decided to actively involve the kids in the festival. I went to the school myself to invite them. That way, they knew the festival was free, and that of course they were welcome at all the workshops. It worked.

Then I thought: why not also let them hear the music? I invited bands like the Blue Grass Boogiemen to perform at the school. It was a huge hit: the kids went wild, singing and dancing along.

That sparked the next idea: what if we taught them to play music themselves? We started with ukulele workshops led by Gijsbert Ditteweg, and they were a big success. But I wanted to go a step further: not just learning to play, but becoming part of the festival.

That’s how the school band was born. A band we build together with the children, using ukuleles, bass, mandolin, and guitar, who eventually get to open the festival.

It transformed the kids from spectators into participants. Or better yet: into an essential part of the Rotterdam Bluegrass Festival. And who knows… maybe ten years from now, we’ll have our very own generation of Rotterdam bluegrass musicians”