YOUNG Durham musicians are being invited to join in jazz and world music jam sessions that start this weekend.

Being held at Alington House, North Bailey, Durham, they are being organised by Durham City Arts' Free Range Music project for brass and wind players and percussionists and will be led by Nigel Greenwood, of the Real Macaws.

A spokesman for the project said: "All you need is to own your own instrument, play to a decent standard - an understanding of scales and a range of about an octave and a half is an advantage - and be excited about creating music in this challenging and rewarding way."

Saturday's session will start at 10.30am. Future events will alternate between Saturday mornings and Friday evenings to allow as many people as possible to attend on a drop-in basis. The sessions are free.

The spokesman said: "We understand that young musicians are often very busy and do not expect participants to come to every session. For full details, you should check www.freerangemusic.org

"During these sessions, we will not be using printed music, so everyone can be as creative as they want to be, and we will be working with some high-profile and exciting professional musicians during the year."

Mr Greenwood said: "We have had some wonderful successes with similar projects in the past, but on a much smaller scale."

For more information, call Mr Greenwood or Rob Guest on 0191-301 8245.