New wave of talent emerges

Youth Week will be returning this year from April 1 to 9, with events aimed at highlighting the best that the youth of Ku-ring-gai have to offer, and the best that Ku-ring-gai have to offer its youth.

The week of festivities includes movie nights, a film festival and a concert at The Fitz Youth Centre rounding out the week of events. The film competition asked for local aspiring movie directors to ponder life growing up in Ku-ring-gai while the musical events will performances from local musicians.

A campaign aimed at educating participants of the problems associated with alcohol will also feature during the week. 'Know your limits' and the dangers of drink spiking will be two issues that the Ku-ring-gai Council Youth Services Officer Josh Donohoe hopes young locals will take away from the week.

"I feel like it's a positive thing to focus our events around problems associated with drinking," says Donohoe. "In a way it's aimed at prevention, but it is a relevant issue to the youths in this area, so it is mainly about awareness and education."

Organised events like Youth Week not only provide constructive and educative activities for young citizens, it also gives a leg up to local talent. One such talent receiving said leg upwards are a group called Super Florence Jam.

Super Florence Jam met at Shoreshocked, another local Youth Week concert in 2004. This year sees them playing at the band night at The Fitz as well as at Shoreshocked, an opportunity that will see them play alongside a number of internationally recognised Australian acts at Sydney's biggest, free youth concert.

"It's a thrill." Says guitarist Francesco. "Being able to play to so many people who are there to enjoy themselves is great, because as a band it means you rise to the challenge. The enthusiasm is hard to avoid."

While the group have played at a number of events and venues around Sydney, even taking out top place at the University of NSW band competition last year, Francesco admits, "Shoreshocked is another thing entirely."

In the group's short existence, they have managed to achieve great feats, including their song 'Dream' making it to number 2 on the independent radio charts. Such successes don't come without talent or the right environment to showcase their skills.

"We've found a lot of support at The Fitz," claims lead singer Adam. "At the moment were kind of bouncing back and forth between safety relative safety of "youth" gigs and the do it yourself nature of the pub circuit where you really need to take care of everything business wise. There's no doubt that the youth centres in the area helped us start, and are still helping us."