FOR the last three years,  have been living and studying in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

As the home of Prince, Husker Du, The Replacements, Babes in toyland, and (from just up the road in Hibbing), Bob Dylan, Minneapolis has been one of the most influential cities in contemporary American musical history. Despite this, Minneapolis has nothing that compares to Lancaster's Music Co-op.

My musician friends' jaws drop here when I tell them that in my hometown Of Lancaster, there is a place where bands can walk to, to rehearse and record by the hour for less than the price of a pitcher Of Budweiser.  

While recent observers have rightly argued that the Co-op provides a safe, cheap and well managed space for musicians of all ages, and supports the larger network of the city's cultural life, less emphasised has been the Co-op's centrality to the local economy.

By continually generating the bands that have brought people into the city's pubs and clubs week-in week-out over the years, the Co-op has actually encouraged people to go out and spend their money.

The Yorkshire House, John O'Gaunt, Gregson Center, Brown Cow, and The Bobbin are just a few places that have thrived from the community of musicians and music fans that the Co-op has helped to cultivate and sustain.

And of course, the Co-op continues to foster the relationship between the city and Lancaster University by bringing the student community into town to use its facilities, and to enjoy the bands that it helps to develop.

During my extensive travels throughout the United States, I have found Lancaster's music scene to be unmatched in any city of similar size (as well as many larger ones), and this, it is clear, has absolutely everything to do with the support that the Co-op constantly provides to the local music community.

While the closure of the Music Co-op is far from certain, such an act of barbarism would demonstrate a startling lack of foresight on the part of those who would support this. It would not only obliterate a key institution within the city's cultural and economic base, but also degrade Lancaster's rich tradition of cultural and artistic production.

 David Gray Minneapolis