On 14th November, ACM staff, tutors, students and alumni gathered to celebrate our biggest group of graduates yet, with over 320 students graduating!
The event was a chance for students across all of our courses to reflect on their achievements throughout their time at ACM, to continue to build their network for the careers ahead of them, and, of course, to don the mortarboards and gowns and celebrate with friends and family.
“Our graduates are leaving behind a legacy of achievement that is profound, demonstrating a propensity to succeed in the classroom, on a concert stage, in a recording studio, or in the community. In doing so, they have displayed their considerable talents, skills, passion, and knowledge. We are immensely proud of you, and look forward to supporting you further in any way we can as you go forward in your career, and literally become the future of the music industry. Well done Class of 2017!”
Mike Sturgis, Head of Education, ACM
With over 1000 people packed into the spectacular G-Live in Guildford, the ceremony offered a couple of bands the chance to perform to a huge crowd of their peers. ACM alumni China Bears were singled out by Frank Turner himself as “brilliant”. Mardhys, made up of current ACM students, performed a triumphant set to close the show.
As is becoming annual tradition for us, Graduation also gave us the chance to honour one of our graduating students with the Musician’s Company Scholarship Award. The Musician’s Company are a well-established charity that support young musicians as they make their way into the music industry. We were delighted to give this year’s award to Caleb Wilson, who demonstrated a high level of musicality and professionalism throughout his studies.
We were honoured to be joined by acclaimed singer-songwriter Frank Turner as our guest speaker, who has been a friend of ACM’s for a number of years. True to form, he delivered a heartfelt performance followed by an inspiring speech drawing from his wealth of experiences in the music industry.
“I’m very proud to call myself an entertainer. If you think of how society works as a diagram, over here you’ve got doctors, teachers, nurses, you’ve got people who do real jobs that make the world go round, and there’s one little corner over here which says ‘entertainers’, and our job is, when everybody else has had a difficult week working their job they don’t like, they come down to a gig venue or wherever it might be, and they get an hour and a half to raise the roof, lift the weight of the world off their shoulders for a little bit, and we’re the people who do that. That’s an absolute privilege and you should be absolutely proud to be those people.”
Frank Turner
Once again, an enormous congratulations to our Class of 2017. We can’t wait to see the impact you have across the creative industries. Remember to keep in touch and let us know about the incredible paths you follow in your career.
If you’d like to study at ACM, please call our Admissions Team on 01483 500 841 or visit www.acm.ac.uk/open-days/ to book a place on an ACM Open Day today.
