Meet Nathaniel Dye, our new Music Mark Champion

We are pleased to welcome musician and music teacher Nathaniel Dye as our new Music Mark Champion, joining Faz Shah, Dr Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason, and Kris Halpin. Nathaniel shares his journey and passion for making music and educating young people.

My name is Nathaniel Dye and I am a musician and music teacher. My route into the profession began conventionally enough with a degree in Bass Trombone Performance and Studio Composition leading to a PGCE and early Secondary career, with two of the Mercury and Brit award-winning Ezra Collective passing through my stable.

But it was in working with younger children that I really found my niche and within a decade, built a one-person Inner London State Primary School music department to boast four varieties of whole class instrumental music, five choirs and a small group instrumental lesson programme that feeds a fifty strong school orchestra. This depth and breadth of music provision was recognised with the award of Outstanding Music Department at the 2023 Music and Drama Education Awards. Music education has also occupied my spare time: I conduct the community-based Pavilion Brass Band as well as the Newham Music Hub Jazz Collective, which made it all the way to the Music for Youth Proms in Autumn 2023.

I have always sought to share good practice, giving whatever I can back to the profession, and have written a number of pieces for Music Teacher Magazine, presented twice at the Music and Drama Education Expo (MDEE), judged the 2024 awards and took a place on the 2025 MDEE advisory board. More recently, I have advised the Department for Education Music Team and met with the Secretary of State for Education, in order to advocate passionately for music education at a national level. It is this work that led to my second Music and Drama Education Award in as many years.

However, work towards providing meaningful musical opportunities for all is never finished and this is why I am delighted to join Music Mark as a ‘champion’.

“A champion for what?” You may reasonably ask, as the answers are not necessarily straightforward.

A champion for the sheer joy of shared musical experiences, however that looks, or most importantly, sounds.  I have spent long enough making music in the community to know that music is at its most powerful when allowed to grow amongst equals and well away from the self-perpetuating stagnation of musical elitism.

A champion for the ensemble leaders, instrumental/vocal tutors and whole class teachers, who are the most brilliant and successful professional musicians in their own right, yet give their time to nurture the next generation towards pursuing their own musical dreams. If only the sense of accomplishment felt from ‘inspiring’ the musicians of the future were accompanied by a fair wage because, sadly, the opposite is true and maintaining a portfolio career (often) without sufficient teacher training or support really is a tough gig.

A champion for the hundreds of National Portfolio Organisations struggling to provide high-quality music provision in the face of funding cuts that are further demoralising an underpaid and undervalued workforce and taking invaluable musical opportunities away from those who need them most.

A champion for music. Yes – in order to produce tomorrow’s professional musicians, we must (and at our best, we certainly do) teach them well. But what if there is no longer a music industry for them, let alone us, to join? Maintaining (and dare I say…developing) our musical ecosystem feels the most daunting task. But it does not just fall upon us to get on with, but to society – from that enthusiastic four-year-old fashioning their first drum kit out of pots, pans and paintbrushes – right up to those holding the purse strings at the highest levels of government.

And where do I come into all this? I would dearly love to utilise this platform to declare some lofty ideals, hold the government to account somehow or simply keep plugging away. After all, this has been quite successful so far.

But no… unfortunately, life hasn’t worked out like that.

Because just as I was starting to see the award-worthy success that comes from year upon year of sheer hard work in the classroom, I found myself emerging from a small hospital waiting room a completely different person. Just after half-term in Autumn 2022, I was diagnosed with stage four incurable bowel cancer. What was I supposed to do now? It soon became clear that almost everyone expected me to clear my desk, hang up my conductor’s baton and, presumably, go away to die quietly.

Well… another scan of the first few paragraphs above will show that I was only just getting started. Yes – cancer (and all the associated treatment) has robbed me of availability and reliability; I have only been able to return to work for one full term out of seven since diagnosis. But I like to think that choosing to continue teaching music at a time when no one would expect me to do anything at all makes a powerful statement. I firmly believe we have the best job in the world and still can think of no better use of the precious time I have left. The children I work with – they don’t have money – they have me. I write this having recently been given a medically defined terminal diagnosis, meaning that this, my 40th, will most likely be my last year of life. Another classroom comeback may now be unrealistic, but I’m far from done and as long as I can stand up, it will be for music and musicians.

… and if this inspires you, just imagine what you could do… with years and decades, not just weeks and months to make an impact.

For more on Nathaniel’s story, including his newly released solo album Matters of Life and Death go to bowelcancerbucketlist.com.