How many more girls were abused at Chetham's music school? Allegations against FIVE other teachers... By Tom Rawstorne, Tom Leonard and James Tozer Frances Andrade's death has sparked a string of allegations against male ex-teachers at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester As she prepared to give evidence against the teacher who had groped and indecently assaulted her as a teenage schoolgirl, Frances Andrade was motivated by one aim. Not the desire to punish her abuser, Michael Brewer, but to blaze a trail so that others who had suffered might secure justice, too. "As far as she was concerned, her case was the tip of the iceberg," said her 21-year-old son Oliver, a student at Cambridge University. She knew about others who had been treated like she had and she wanted that to come out. Tragically, as the Mail reported last week, Mrs Andrade, a brilliant violinist and mother of four, did not live to see Brewer and his wife, Kay, convicted of indecent assault. She committed suicide midway through last month's trial, her version of events having been dismissed as "lies" and "fantasy" during cross-examination by Brewer's female barrister. But today, we can reveal that Mrs Andrade's death has indeed sparked an outpouring of allegations of sexual assault against male ex-teachers who have worked at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester, where she was abused by Brewer. He was director of music at the school, the most prestigious of its type in the country. Police have received more than 20 individual reports of sexual offences understood to have involved six male teachers. Some of the allegations date as far back as the Seventies. On Thursday, detectives made an arrest in what they say is a "fast-moving investigation." Chinese-born violin teacher Wen Zhou Li, who has taught at Chetham's since 1996, was arrested in Cheshire on suspicion of rape. Others accused by ex-pupils are former strings tutor Chris Ling, 55, and the piano teacher Ryszard Bakst, who died in 1999. Allegations have also surfaced about Malcolm Layfield, who admitted having a string of relationships with students aged 16 to 18 at Chetham's and the distinguished Royal Northern College of Music, also in Manchester. If only Mrs Andrade were alive to see that people had not only listened to her testimony, but were inspired by it to come forward. Over the years, she had met and spoken with several former female pupils of Chetham's and discussed what had happened to them. Michael Brewer, left, and his ex-wife Hilary Kay Brewer, right, were both found guilty of sexually assaulting Frances Andrade, 30 years ago. Andrade committed suicide before the verdict was announced Many had been deeply scarred and, like Mrs Andrade, just wanted to put it all behind them. Others, working in a notoriously tight-knit industry, feared that if their complaints were not believed, their professional careers would be over. Shockingly, it is now being claimed that many had complained - not just to staff at Chetham's but also to the police. Take the story of the accused violinist, Chris Ling. Disturbing allegations about him were published this week, although it is not believed he has been questioned by police. The 55-year-old classical music impresario left Britain more than 20 years ago, and now lives in a £1 million house in California. Indeed, as he wallowed in his rooftop hot tub overlooking the sun-soaked San Fernando valley, he must have felt as though Chetham's and his past life in damp, grey Manchester were a million miles away. His garage boasts a sleek black Jaguar and a silver Mercedes 350 belonging to his wife Pip Clarke, a pretty professional violinist 11 years his junior, with whom he has a teenage daughter, Francesca. The perfect family, living the American dream. Until this week, that is, when the carefully crafted life he had built up was shattered. More than a dozen of his former pupils have come forward to claim the violin teacher sexually abused them between 1980 and 1989. They described how the charismatic Mr Ling would make them - then girls aged 12 to 15 - play their instruments naked, smacking their bare bottoms and fondling their breasts. One, who was 15 at the time, even alleged Mr Ling had persuaded her to pleasure him and then sexually assaulted her. "It was repulsive but I didn't know what to do," she said. Malcolm Layfield has already admitted having a string of relationships with students aged 16 to 18 at Chetham's and the distinguished Royal Northern College of Music, also in Manchester A teacher at Chetham's between 1980 and 1989, Mr Ling was a Svengali-like figure. His students, boarding and away from home for the first time, found themselves competing to become one of his protegees, a group known as "Ling's Strings." "It was like a cult," one former pupil said. They would start dressing differently, in tighter clothes, wearing make-up and would practise for up to ten hours a day. In anonymised reports published this week, at least four women have claimed Mr Ling groomed them for sexual abuse by encouraging them to play the violin naked. Despite many saying they did not want to report Mr Ling for fear of upsetting their parents, complaints were made. One male pupil who heard what was happening confided in his housemaster, only to be told he was being a "vulgar, smutty schoolboy spreading rumours." Another alleged victim claimed she told John Vallins, headmaster between 1974 and 1992, about what had happened to her. Mr Vallins says he has no recollection of this and that the first he knew of any problems was when police started to investigate Mr Ling in late 1990. "I am extremely unhappy at the suggestion that I said I would look into something but nothing was done," he said. I am profoundly distressed at the suggestion that if I had good reason to suggest any improper behaviour towards any pupil, I would not have acted on it. The police intervention was prompted by a girl who claimed to have been abused from the age of 12. Ten of Mr Ling's female students were subsequently interviewed by police. In March 1991, the story was reported in a British newspaper under the headline "Music girl's maestro in sex probe." Mr Ling vehemently protested his innocence, and no charges were brought against him. Mr Ling's alleged victims have said they were told police could not extradite him for questioning from the U.S., where he moved in 1990. It has been claimed he missed his mother's funeral because he was scared he would be arrested if he set foot on UK soil. When he went to the U.S., Mr Ling took with him Pip Clarke, one of his former pupils, whom he'd married in 1989 when she was 21. They lived in Miami but moved to Los Angeles in 1994, where he set up a classical music talent agency. He manages not only his wife but a number of musicians, actors and conductors - the majority of them attractive young women. Chinese-born violin teacher Wen Zhou Li, who has taught at Chetham's since 1996, has been arrested on suspicion of rape With his days as a student pin-up far behind him, today Mr Ling cuts a shambolic figure. He has spent the past week shut inside his home refusing to answer the allegations. His wife was also unwilling to talk. For another of the alleged abusers from Chetham's, however, there can be no right of reply. Piano teacher Ryszard Bakst taught at the school from the Seventies until his retirement in the mid-Nineties. A Polish emigre and eminent Chopin specialist, he died in 1999 aged 72. An obituary in The Times praised the "profound and lasting influence" he had on the many young pianists he taught. But at least five women have come forward to claim he sexually assaulted them as teenagers during the Seventies, often making them touch him intimately. One, a mother in her 50s, told the Mail she was abused for five years, describing Mr Bakst as "a beast." She says that when she told her housemistress about the abuse in 1972, pupils were simply told not to go to teachers" houses. "I must have been the first girl he abused after starting at Chetham's - I was only 16," she said. It went on for five years, first at Chetham's and then the Royal Northern. The whole time I was having to fend him off, but I had to get my degree so I had to put up with him. After leaving Chetham's, the woman says she met Michael Brewer in the Eighties, when he was conducting the National Youth Choir. "I told him every detail about my sexual abuse at the hands of Bakst but he didn't say anything," she said. Now I realise he was just about the worst possible person to speak to because he had sexually abused pupils, too. The woman is due to be interviewed by police next week. As for Malcolm Layfield, another former teacher, his name was thrown back into the spotlight during the case against Brewer. More than 20 reports of sexual offences at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester have now been made by ex-pupils It was suggested by Mrs Andrade that Brewer knew about Mr Layfield's relationships with pupils but did not act because he himself was compromised by what was going on between them. In 2002, he was promoted to the position of head of the school of strings at the Royal Northern College of Music. His appointment led to two colleagues" resignations over their concerns that he'd had inappropriate sexual relations with girls aged between 16 and 18. These concerns, including statements from the women he was alleged to have targeted, were passed to the authorities at the college by colleagues opposed to his appointment. At the time, the Mail published a detailed account of the allegations. We reported how rumours about Mr Layfield's "wandering eye" first surfaced during the Eighties and Nineties when he had a part-time job at Chetham's. During one-to-one tutoring sessions Mr Layfield, then in his early 30s and recently married, was said to have formed "strong bonds" with several female students. "He would befriend girls at Chetham's, then carry on the relationships when they moved to the Royal Northern College of Music," said a source. His modus operandi, according to his accusers, usually involved drink, flattery and promises to help the careers of his students. How many girls succumbed to Mr Layfield is unclear. But when confronted with the evidence, he admitted to "relationships" with at least six pupils, some of whom were just 16. It was stated that all these girls were over the age of consent and the "liaisons" were "consensual." Despite being informed of his background, the principal and governors at the Royal Northern supported his appointment, saying they believed Mr Layfield's behaviour was in the past and "unlikely to reoccur." Police did not launch an investigation as they had received no formal complaint. In the wake of Mrs Andrade's death, the circumstances surrounding Mr Layfield's appointment have once more been revisited. Earlier this week, he resigned from the board of governors at the Royal Northern and is off work sick. He has insisted again that at no stage were "allegations of criminal behaviour" made against him. The true extent of the scandal - which Frances Andrade began when she bravely stood up in court and recounted the atrocities she had suffered at the hands of her music master, Mr Brewer - has yet to be established. But one thing is clear: the death of the troubled musician who lifted the lid on decades of abuse wasn't in vain.