Professional theatre and television director Ruth Carney established Carney Academy in 2010, offering entertainment industry standard performance training for pupils from age five through to adult.
In the past 15 years the Academy has become an integral part of Sheffield’s artistic scene and performance community, offering weekly classes, workshops and summer schools.
Past students have gone on to professional drama schools such as LAMDA and the Guildford School of Acting, and have performed in award-winning shows such as Everybody’s Talking About Jamie and Shrek The Musical, while student TV credits include Emmerdale, Death In Paradise and Casualty.
And now it has been confirmed that the Carney Academy has a new home in the iconic Victoria Hall in Sheffield city centre, where it is offering classes in the Upper Hall on Tuesday evenings and all day Saturday.
“We are so pleased to welcome Carney Academy,” said Rose Durant, Chief Executive of The Foundry Sheffield, the charitable organisation that has been running the Victoria Hall since 2015.
“It is proof of the enormous versatility of our facilities and it is important to us that we are able to welcome a diverse range of visitors through our doors every week.
“What many people may not realise is that as well as being a home for Methodism in the city centre, the Victoria Hall has a long tradition of supporting the arts and before the launch of Sheffield City Hall in 1932, the Hall was the leading concert venue in the city, with many leading national orchestras playing concerts there.
“As we maintain our place as a centre for all communities at the heart of the city, we are very happy to remind people of the spaces we have available for performance.
“The Hallam Sinfonia play here, we have had the Sheffield Chamber of Music Festival host events and we are the home of the Sheffield Philharmonic Orchestra as well as a regular venue for the Sheffield Oratorio Chorus and Sheffield Bach Society.
“And we also now host regular classical music by candlelight concerts which have brought a whole new audience to the hall.
“We look forward to building our relationship with the Carney Academy team and seeing the ways they utilise the space we offer.”
Other sites in The Foundry Sheffield’s portfolio include Sheffield’s Quaker meeting House, Walkley Ebenezer Methodist Church and Broomhill Methodist Centre.
To find out more about The Foundry Sheffield and the facilities now being offered at the Victoria Hall and other sites visit www.victoriahallsheffield.org
To find out more about the Carney Academy visit www.carneyacademy.co.uk/sheffield