Tik Tok video of former Rothbury violinist drives demand for wedding bookings

Charlotte Kennedy, originally from Rothbury, started to play the violin at the age of five and was further inspired when folk musician Kathryn Tickell visited her school and suggested that she needed a full-sized instrument.

Her mother went into the loft and found a violin that Charlotte’s father used to play when he was younger.

She was enrolled into a music education programme so that she could harness her talent and went on to study music at Durham University. Now, she teaches music to children herself.

“My acoustic violin cleaned up well and sounded good, but it did have an annoying buzz which meant that I couldn’t use it to perform with,” said Charlotte, now based in North Shields.

"I love this violin as it has sentimental attachments as it was my dad’s who passed away when I was 19, but I knew it wasn’t up to the standard I needed.”

In 2018, Charlotte applied for a grant from the Sunday for Sammy Trust to replace the old violin.

She auditioned using her dad’s instrument and impressed the panel of trustees who granted her £1,500 towards a new one.

As Charlotte needed to find the remaining balance herself, trustee Ray Laidlaw said that there was no time limit on the grant and to claim it when she was ready.

Life moved on and Covid struck, and Charlotte’s priorities changed. She took on a music teaching job with In Harmony North East, a community based orchestral project which aims to change the lives of children living in the West End of Newcastle through music.

“After the pandemic I realised just how much I missed playing and connecting with an audience and sharing my music with others,” she said. “I felt that if I died tomorrow and I hadn’t done anything useful involving performing that I’d missed out.

“A friend in London told me that there was a market for electric violin players at weddings and events and I started to research what was out there. I found that there was a demand in the area and all that I needed was an electric instrument and amplifier.”

Five years on, Charlotte has bought a new, pure white electric violin.

“I love my electric violin it makes a gorgeous sound and already I’ve got quite a few wedding bookings,” she revealed. I’m really grateful to Sunday for Sammy especially as they honoured the grant after five long years.”

A Tik Tok video of Charlotte playing the electric violin has received thousands of views with people enquiring about her travelling to Europe, Canada, and America to play at their weddings.

Trustee Paul Irwin said: “This is what we do at the Sunday for Sammy Trust, we give young talent the opportunity to progress in their chosen art. Normally we don’t have to wait five years to give away our money but in Charlotte’s case it was worth the wait.”