Beach Ballroom

I came across a letter in the evening express yesterday saying that the Beach Ballroom should be used as a place for teenagers to go for music and dancing, like it used to be.

The other year the school I was in did Grease at the ballroom, along one of the corridors they've got photos of such things as the Beatles playing there. It was actually quite sad to discover that the council's view of it is that it is a space to hire. I also heard some stories of bands which have been in, their primary choice of venue and their crew were surprised both at how good a venue it is and how unknown as a venue it is. To me that says that the ballroom is yet another symptom of the mismanagement that our council has become well known for.

It really is the poor younger sibling of the family of venues/theatre spaces within Aberdeen, it really is a shame that the council appear to treat it as Cinderella when with a bit of investment and some sensible management it could turn quite a profit.

But back to the point of the letter, the writer was saying how it would give teenagers something to do other than hanging around, drinking etc. Whilst I disagree with the generalising I do agree that some teenagers do hang around outside and get drunk because there's nothing to do, however being teenagers what they really mean is "there's nothing to do that we want to do", so for such a plan to work it would have to be well managed and advertised. That is to say done by someone other than the council.