LONDON – Ed Sheeran wants people to take music in schools seriously.

The British singer-songwriter has set up a foundation to ensure that kids in the U.K. get access to “high-quality” music education.

Sheeran started writing songs from a young age, after encouragement from a teacher, and says he wants to help plug the gap left by reduced arts funding. To support the launch of the foundation, the Grammy-winner is visiting schools and youth groups in Cardiff, Coventry, Edinburgh and Belfast.

Addressing a group of pupils in Wales on Thursday, alongside his songwriting partner Amy Wadge, Sheeran said that music should be treated as a legitimate career option.

“Britain has this sort of thing where it’s pushing people towards being bankers or like working in tech or finance or like all this sort of stuff,” said Sheeran.

“We’ve basically just come here today being like, We’ve done it. We both came from state school education and all that takes is you guys having confidence built in you by the teachers around you,” he added.

Sheeran has a special connection with Wales: as a teenager, he visited Wadge in the Welsh capital, Cardiff, to work on his songs, an experience he described as a “key stage” of his life.

He treated pupils to a performance of one of his biggest hits, “Shape of You” and also duetted with young musicians at a Cardiff youth group.

So far the Ed Sheeran Foundation says it has supported 18 grassroots music education organizations or state school music departments, which will improve access to instruments and lessons for 12,000 children.

The organization says it also aims to advocate for the “essential role” of music teachers and the way music can transform the lives of young people.

In an Instagram post about the initiative, Sheeran says he wants children to benefit from music education, just as he did.

“It was incredible for my mental health as a kid, feeling a sense of purpose and achievement, even just learning piano or cello at a young age way before songwriting. I want kids to be able to learn instruments, learn production and songwriting, performing, and have apprenticeship schemes help them learn different skills to enter the industry.”

Sheeran also underlines the amount of people employed in the music industry, aside from the onstage talent, adding that 150 people work on his tour.

A report by UK Music said 216,000 people in the U.K. were employed in the music industry in 2023.