School of Rock comes to town

The students, from BIMM Brighton, talked about their careers in the music industry and gave a band performance. Joining the Rye College students were be children from other local schools.

Students at BIMM have a very different experience from many other students. This is a college where the students have visits from Paul Weller, Scissor Sisters, Roger Daltrey and Lemmy from Motorhead, who tell them their life experiences and teach them how to survive on tour, and Glastonbury founder Michael Eavis hands out the degrees certificates to all the graduates. Recent success stories include Elliott Andrews, drumming with Paulo Nutini, Rene Woollard, guitarist with Jessie J and Tinchy Stryder, Matt Garrity, guitarist with the X-Factor band, The Kooks, who famously met and studied at BIMM, Kate Walsh, the first unsigned artist to have an iTunes No.1, and Bitter Ruin, recently championed by Stephen Fry and Matt Lucas and a former No. 1 in the Amazon chart.

Pictured here left to right, are musicians Vernon Whitmore, Anthony Sullivan and Ryan Whitmore.