Bricks & More Tom Ashton and Paul Cutts profile some diverse venues and their approaches to community music and education work   Who: The Sage Where: Gateshead When: Year Round What: The newest community music and education provider in Britain

It's hard to believe but, last month (December 2005), The Sage Gateshead celebrated its first birthday. The £70m, Norman Foster-designed venue opened its doors at 5pm on 17 December 2004, marking the culmination of eight years of hard work to turn a derelict site on the banks of the river Tyne into one of the finest centres for music anywhere in the world.

The launch party – in true northeast style – carried on until Sunday night with 15 back-to-back performances and participatory workshops, encouraging 15,000 people over the threshold.

From the outset, The Sage's learning and participation team – comprising Andrew Scott and community music director Katherine Zeserson – has championed and challenged the notion of education outreach. Its unique philosophy is embedded in its vision statement and its management structures – and most dramatically reflected in its annual statistics.

During its opening year, the venue hosted 438 performances but staged more than 12,300 Learning and Participation sessions. In total, around 750,000 visitors walked through its welcoming portal.

Even before the physical structure was in place, The Sage had been spearheading community music initiatives. One was the three-year project Voices of the River's Edge, begun in 2003 and a celebration of East Gateshead . More than 1,000 people learnt about and created new music, songs, texts and stories.

The breadth of The Sage's learning and participation programme is staggering – from early years and work with all tiers of formal education to community music, instrumental and vocal learning and teacher-training and development. It runs a Weekend School for talented young musicians of all genres and hosts a choir for the 50-plus age group called the Silver Singers. The group was one of those that performed for HM The Queen when she officially opened the centre.

According to Anthony Sargent, general director of The Sage, ‘Our local communities have been absolutely key, making a tremendous journey of musical discovery with us.' Part of that discovery has included folk music, an area of interest that is being fostered further this year when The Sage hosts the Folkworks True North festival – a celebration of the music and musicians of the north east.

Nor has World Music been overlooked. In the very week of its anniversary, The Sage staged a series of masterclasses, workshops and performances featuring leading Indian sarod player Wajahat Khan (pictured opposite) and the Medici String Quartet.The event was a partnership with the Pakistan Cultural Society (PCS), the Newcastle-based agency that for more than a decade has been providing a creative voice in the region for artists of Pakistani and South Asian origin. The PCS' new aim is to transcend its current programme of arts and education and develop ‘milestone projects that encourage people to embrace cultural diversity'. The Sage is key to it achieving its ambitions.

This holistic approach to music and education – embracing all communities and all genres – has earned The Sage international acclaim in a remarkably short period of time, bringing major organisations to discover the centre for themselves. In 2005, The Sage became the first British venue to host Womex (the international world music expo) and hosted ISPA (the international performing arts society) as well as the National Association of Music Educators' annual colloquy. In late January, many of the country's leading orchestral administrators will be arriving in Gateshead for the Association of British Orchestras' annual conference.

The challenge now is how to maintain the momentum. But with an endowment fund of £11.8m – believed to be the largest for a single arts project in the UK – its artistic programming base is exceptionally secure.

North Music Trust – the registered charity that runs The Sage – receives an annual income from the fund, which supports the venue's artistic and education work in the building and throughout the North of England.

The Sage Gateshead St Mary's Square Gateshead Quays Gateshead NE8 2JR Tel: 0191 443 4666 www.thesagegateshead.org