Nottingham venue hands young people a free recording studio, a sports hall and the confidence to take any stage
Added by Love Business East Midlands | 18 July 2026
UPDATED: 21 July 2026
From Monday 20 July, young people aged 7 to 25 will be able to walk into a professional recording studio and a sports hall on Lowdham Street and use them for free. CRS Nottingham’s ten-week summer programme runs five afternoons a week until 25 September, offering 180 hours of free sessions across music, sport and performance training.
The doors open against a bleak national picture. More than 640 youth centres have closed across the UK since 2010, with council spending on youth services in England cut by 73% in real terms, according to YMCA England & Wales. The holidays themselves have become a financial pressure point: recent research found parents spend around £100 extra a week keeping children fed and entertained over summer, and an average of £349 per child on holiday clubs and camps.
CRS is not a newcomer stepping into that gap it has been filling it for 35 years. Founded by Trevor Rose in 1991, the CRS is one of Nottingham’s cultural anchors, and many of the city’s best-known artists began their journey in its rooms: Scorzayzee, Lee Ramsey, Tempa, Karizma, MC C-Mone, Young T & Bugsey, Nina Smith, Jamal Sterrett and Nartz among them. This summer, the next generation works with the people who built that legacy sessions run alongside Rose himself and Jah Digga, the St Ann’s-raised rapper, poet and longtime CRS mentor whose work with schools and youth groups across the city uses music to tackle knife crime.
The programme — one space, three ways to shine — runs across three strands:
- OnTrack (music and recording) — professional studios and real kit. Sessions run from beatmaking and digital creation through audio production and sound engineering, so young people leave with a finished, mixed track and the skills to make the next one.
- OnPitch (sport) — football, dodgeball and basketball tournaments alongside street hockey and open free play, in 3, 4 and 5-a-side formats — room for the competitive and the just-here-for-fun alike.
- OnShow (creative arts) — vocal performance, acting and stagecraft, dance, spoken word and creative expression. There is no theatre here — the point is getting young people ready for one, building the confidence to stand up and be heard wherever the stage turns out to be.
Ages 7–13 attend on Mondays and Wednesdays, 4–7pm; ages 14–25 on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, 4–8pm. Every session, every strand, every week is free.
“Talent isn’t the thing young people are short of round here” said Jordan St Germain, Chief Operating Officer of CRS Nottingham. “So we stopped waiting. We opened a space, filled it with the real gear and the right people, and took away the price tag. Whether people wants to record a track, play in a tournament or get ready for their first stage production, it starts here, on their doorstep, this summer.”
“The names on our wall — from Scorzayzee to Young T & Bugsey — all started as young individuals walking through this door. Hundreds of youth clubs have closed across the country, and summer has become one of the most expensive times of year for families. We can’t fix that from one building on Lowdham Street, but we can make sure that in this city, this summer, cost is never the reason the next name misses out.”
The programme runs weekdays from Monday 20 July to Friday 25 September 2026 at Lowdham Street, Nottingham NG3 2DP. Sessions are free and drop-in friendly.
