Dales Jam, the Skipton-based community jazz orchestra, has won funding for a new piece of music.

It is one of only three groups in Yorkshire and 47 not-for profit groups nationwide to receive a grant from the BBC Performing Arts Fund Community Music Scheme.

The newly commissioned piece will be premiered as part of the 2013 Grassington Festival at Settle’s Victoria Hall on Sunday.

Guest soloist will be Supertramp saxophonist John Helliwell.

The piece will also be performed at Richmond Jazz Festival and other venues across the Dales.

Richard Ormrod, Jazz Yorkshire’s 2012 Musician of the Year and Dales Jam musical director, has worked with Settle-based youth ensemble RAMjam, the Richmond Jam youth ensemble and young musicians from Craven schools to develop a suite of pieces to accompany silent movies from the Yorkshire Film Archives.

Richard, a multi-instrumentalist, arranger and composer, said: “Winning this funding provides a fantastic opportunity to harness the huge creative potential of North Yorkshire amateur musicians to create and perform an original piece of music inspired by the locality and geography, the history of local community and films from the Yorkshire Film Achive.

“I’m tremendously excited by the challenge of leading this project on behalf of Dales Jam and we are very grateful for the support of North Yorkshire Youth Music Action Zones, the Grassington Festival and the Richmond Jazz Festival.”

Welcoming the award on behalf of the 35-member self-governing band, chairman Paul Mawson said: “This is a massive boost for the band and for music in the local community.”

The aim of the BBC Community Music Scheme is to encourage community based groups to tackle an ambitious and challenging project that will develop the talent of its members, raise the group’s profile by contributing to the local community and attract new members.

Tickets for Sunday’s concert are available from grassington-festival.org.uk or call 01756 752691.