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We’re looking for up to 4 Production Assistants to help with the delivery of our 90 Years of Arvo Pärt: A Reflection festival taking place in and around central Oxford from 11-16 November 2025.

The festival builds on the successful Arvo Pärt…and a Littlemore Festival held by Music at Oxford in 2022. It is being brought to Oxford by MaO in collaboration with the Arvo Pärt Centre, the Estonian Embassy in London and the Estonian Ministry of Culture.

If you are enthusiastic and love the arts and working with people, we want to hear from you! This is an ideal position for a music/drama/arts student or graduate, who is looking to develop skills in arts administration and/or concert management and production with an exciting festival. Full training will be provided.

Duties to include:

• Preparation of venues prior to concerts and receptions, including putting out signage / banners, numbering the seating where required, sound/lighting check.
• Transporting marketing assets and other items between venues, by taxi if needed.
• Looking after the needs of the audience, artists, venues and team at a concert.
• Assisting concert attendees, which includes ticketing, giving directions and selling programmes.
• After concert: assisting in returning the venue to the state in which we found it.
• Providing box office phone cover as required
• Social media and marketing support as requested by the Marketing Manager.
• Being the public face of Music at Oxford

Other duties as required during the course of the festival.

These are paid roles (Oxford Living Wage) with various shifts available between 11th-16th November. Hours may vary day to day according to the requirements of the programme. We cannot offer accommodation/travel subsidy for this role, so are looking specifically for someone from the Oxfordshire area.

For full details of the role please click on the following link: Production Assistants job specification

Application 

To apply please either email a CV and covering letter, max. 500 words or a 3 min video, to Roz Surtees, Producer/General Manager at roz@musicatoxford.com.

If you’d like to send a video file, please use WeTransfer: https://wetransfer.com (WeTransfer is a free file sharing site that you can upload to, directly from your phone or computer).

Please let us know where you heard about this position

Application Closing Date: 5pm, Tuesday 21^st October

Interviews will take place on Thursday 23^rd and Friday 24^th October 2025 on Zoom. If you are unable to attend this date, please let us know in your application and we will try to find an alternative time.

If you have any questions about this role please contact Roz Surtees: roz@musicatoxford.com

Other Opportunities:

We want to hear from music and sound facilitators in Oxfordshire!

Music at Oxford (MaO) and Oxford Contemporary Music (OCM) are seeking to expand and diversify our networks of music facilitators. We would like to draw from a wider pool of workshop leaders when developing and delivering our learning and participation programmes. We want to understand what skills there are to draw on in the local area.

We are looking for facilitators who can deliver music/sound workshops and projects in Oxford and Oxfordshire. We are especially interested to hear from facilitators who live in Oxfordshire. The participants for our projects vary. They include children and adults, people with a range of abilities and experiences of music, and people with and without additional needs. Some projects happen in a specific school or local area. Some workshops are one-off events, while others are part of a series.

Examples of previous projects include:

Music at Oxford: 

• Co-creative songwriting workshops with KS2 classes
• Improvisatory sessions with care home residents who are living with Dementia
• Improvisatory sessions with those who are vulnerably housed or experiencing homelessness
• School assemblies with a singing focus

Oxford Contemporary Music: 

• Songwriting, DJing, and music production
• Family and early-years music sessions
• Participants making their own instruments
• Music sessions linked to the school curriculum
• Intercultural adult community music sessions

These are just some examples, and future projects may be different from this. We are open to a wide range of artistic practices. We may be inspired to create new projects based on the skills within our expanding network.

You can read more about previous and current and MaO projects at: https://www.musicatoxford.com/learning-and-participation/ and OCM education projects at: https://www.ocmevents.org/learning

While this is a joint call-out, Music at Oxford and OCM usually have separate learning projects.

Our approach

Many of our workshops are not just about developing musical skills. They’re about using music and sound as a tool to engage and deepen learning. This allows our offer to be accessible to participants regardless of their musical ability and experience.

We would like to hear from people who have the following abilities:

• Produce high-quality music or sound art in any style or genre
• Creative and flexible approach
• Inspire and engage participants
• Encourage others to try something new, take creative risks and experiment.
• Work collaboratively with project participants and staff
• Communicate and negotiate effectively
• Reflect, revise, encourage and enable others to do the same.

How to express your interest

It’s easy to submit to the call out – there are just a few short and simple questions. You can submit your answers through the form or send them to us as a short video. (Please send videos to felicity@musicatoxford.com)

Here is the form: https://bit.ly/facil24

Responding to our call-out does not guarantee that we will offer you work. However, we understand the effort involved in submitting an application and have made the submission process as short and simple as we can. We hope to put facilitators on the radars of more organisations with a single submission. To achieve this, if you give permission, we may share your information with other local arts organisations who are looking for facilitators.

There is also a short diversity monitoring form. We are asking for this data only so that we know whether our call out is reaching a wide range of people. It will not be used for any hiring decisions. We will keep this diversity data private and only Oxford Contemporary Music and Music at Oxford will store it securely.

Diversity monitoring form: https://bit.ly/diversity2024-5

We will keep your data on file for up to three years, unless you ask us to change or delete it.

Pay and Equality Statement

Music at Oxford and OCM want to support local musicians and we would like to better represent the diverse community of Oxfordshire. We want to make sure this opportunity is open to everyone, no matter what your background or the challenges you have faced. We would therefore particularly welcome applicants from groups currently underrepresented in our pool of freelancers. This includes those who identify as being from the Global Majority, a lower socio-economic background, trans, non-binary, or are disabled or neurodivergent.

Music at Oxford and OCM are committed to equality in our hiring processes. We make ongoing efforts to make sure we do not discriminate. This includes age, sex, gender identity or expression, sexuality, faith, nationality, ethnicity, disability, neurodivergence, socioeconomic background or parental status.

MaO/ OCM will cover planning time, travel and session fees for freelancers. Rates to be discussed with each organisation individually.

Music at Oxford and OCM are committed to removing barriers that might prevent people feeling comfortable about working with us in any capacity. If you have access requirements of any nature, please talk to us in advance, and we will do everything in our power to ensure your needs are met.

Music at Oxford is a small organisation however we strive to offer work opportunities to suitable people. Every year we look for a small team of concert managers and box office assistants. Due to the small number of concerts where we can offer such work, these roles are best suited to those already working in a freelance capacity or students.  People applying to be a concert manager should ideally be music students. Both of these roles are paid per concert.

OTHER ROLES WITH MUSIC AT OXFORD 

PAID POSITIONS- FREELANCE

CONCERT MANAGER

Responsibilities include:

• Artist liaison on the concert day
• Stage set-up
• Collecting flowers and concert sundries for the concert
• Setting out chairs
• Preparing the venue for the evening
• Liaising with the artist and concert staff during the evening to ensure the smooth running of the concert

BOX OFFICE MANAGER / BOX OFFICE ASSISTANT

Responsibilities include:

• Selling and administering tickets at the venue box office prior to an event
• Directing the public and answering questions regarding the concert
• Helping any latecomers

HOW TO APPLY

To apply for either or both of these roles, please email your CV and a short covering letter to roz@musicatoxford.com.

VOLUNTEERING

STEWARDING

When you join us as a steward you are welcome to join us for as little as one season, although we find that most people wish to continue as part of the team for many years. We are always happy to take on new stewards although not everyone is asked to steward at all the concerts in a season.

Stewards’ Duties:

• Checking tickets
• Ushering audience members to their seats
• Selling programmes
• Providing a warm welcome to Music at Oxford concerts
• Steward a minimum of 5 concerts in any season.
• Stewards’ benefits

At most concerts, we provide seating for our stewards at the concert. We offer our stewards 50% off any ticket for a concert at which they are not stewarding and 15% off any ticket for their friends or family members.

If you’re interested in joining our team, please email: roz@musicatoxford.com.