“When a boy walks into the theatre, they are no longer a pupil – they are a practitioner,” reads the strapline for Eton’s drama page. The tone is so overblown I send it on to Private Eye for Pseuds Corner. I’m researching music and drama faculties in education settings, and, as ever, the difference between state and private schools is astounding.
While the overall number of music A-level entries has declined dramatically since 2010, Charterhouse – Eton’s rival school, as a friend liked to describe his alma mater – says that half of its sixth-form students “go on to further musical studies at a university or conservatoire, with roughly 50% of those gaining places at Oxbridge colleges”.
And, whereas plenty of secondaries have no access to orchestral instruments at all, places like Stowe and Gresham’s have ‘all-Steinway’ status. No out-of-tune uprights here, thank you very much.
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My privately educated peers at university used to say that I had a chip on my shoulder about these inequalities. They were right: when music and drama are being cut from timetables across state schools, and, according to Birkbeck College London, one in three children in the UK has never visited a theatre, it’s difficult not to wince at the artistic splendour available to some.
However, Labour’s Robin Hood VAT levy on education fees – due to take effect in January – could actually exacerbate the situation.
Specialist music schools, such as Chetham’s (Manchester) and the Yehudi Menuhin School (Surrey), are fee-paying institutions that broadly rely on bursaries (including the state-funded Music and Dance Scheme) to support their students. Intake depends on talent, rather than wealth.
