A Music Making conference

On Friday April 28th we'll be showing what we do at Youth + Music =  a Music Making Conference - a conference for teachers, youth workers, musicians, and music practitioners in Bridgwater.

Youth + Music = is organised by local organisation the Somerset Rural Youth Project, who have been project partners of ours for several years now.

Here's Geoff doing some music leading at their conference last year . This year we shall be explaining what we do to make our music workshops more inclusive.

Festivities

Music is fun, as it should be. And seasonal fun is even better. Here's a film of Geoff, volunteer music leader at Count Me In, sharing his festive joy last night... so Merry Christmas to all our amazing group, and supporters, and music leaders - and everyone!

Keeping the skills up

Geoff with his djembe

Geoff has been a volunteer music leader and musician in residence with Count Me In since 2003.
Geoff was at our recent in-house training session with Hugh Nankivell.

'Training is part of the fun! And a new skill - fun, and interesting to be part of the workshop leader team, and meet old and new people. It's fantastic to be part of the team - my interests are about people and socializing!'

At the AllStars training session

Partnerships, meetings, Fast Forward Festival... a busy time

It's been a busy time recently - the last month has been full up.

We've been meeting our fabulous partners who are helping us to set up and deliver an excellent programme of music making. 

We've had meetings and hatched action plans with Wells Cathedral School, the Somerset Rural Youth Project, Elmwood and Penrose federation of schools in Bridgwater, and Spaeda in Langport.

We've run an arts week music day in Fiveways school, who loved our work and want us to come back and do more.

We've visited Fairfield Farm College in Wiltshire and fixed dates to do an evening session there, and an arts week day next year.

Alex and Jane have been planning out the Listening Lounge strand of the project, with a focus on mentoring and Arts Award - that's going to be exciting, a new departure for us. We're looking at creating a space where music therapy and community music can work together -  where we can listen sensitively and respond intentionally.

We attended the Fast Forward Festival 'Inclusive Excellence' conference at The Colston Hall in Bristol. This was a thought provoking day that ended in performances by Drake Music and the Paraorchestra.

We were asked to consider that 'The musical world discriminates against disabled people. If we don’t change this, we endorse it.
1. What must the music industry do to create a fair ecology?
2. How can music education change to prepare young disabled musicians for this new ecology?'
We went away with a head full of questions and ideas about access, ability, inclusion, and participation. We need more chance to meet and investigate these big issues together. It's  a vibrant discussion and there are so many angles.
AllStars offers an informal music education environment where our team do their best to provide a valuable, progressive experience for everyone, reacting to individual abilities and interests. We feel we can work with young people who wouldn't have been offered much in the way of formal musical education; we believe access to live music making is a universal right. Not sure if this is 'inclusive excellence', but it's always surprising and exciting, and goes further than we ever thought it would. One thing for sure, there's no discrimination here. Come and play music with us.

On Thursday Jane joined a conversation on SEN/D music education at the Wiltshire Music Centre. Again - lots of thought provoking questions were raised about music, excellence, and inclusion. One thing that emerged was that the AllStars project may be able to help with CPD and developing the workforce.

What we're looking forward to now is our next music session on July 16th. It's all very well talking about music, but you mustn't forget to play some now and again, too...
This seems to be a good time to say how good it is to be part of such a great team, in the SW, doing what we love best : making music!

Oh - and we mustn't forget Geoff: see you all on Thursday.

Making some joyful noise...

Last night, our taster session demonstrated how we work with themes.
This weeks theme? - well - seeings as we're here in Somerset, and it's midsummer : we held our own pre-Glastonbury 'festival'.
Reggae stage, folk stage, dance stage.

Emma looking cool.

Ryan and Russ waiting to hit the beat.







Geoffrey raising those BPMs.

And here's some of the crew that came

all about AllStars

 And here we are - your music leaders :

Geoffrey

Ben

Russ

Alex

Jane

All at sea!

It's Heart Beats at the Rural Music network tomorrow - Shepton Mallet Baptist church, 7 - 8.

We have chosen 'all at sea' for our theme : so come on you landlubbers....join us for some music for the High Seas, and other rollicking fun.

Drawing with sound ... join us August 30th

On August 30th we're running a workshop for Sound Foundation Somerset / Spaeda / Short Breaks Somerset, at Bow Wharf in Langport.
There are still places available. Suitable for young people and professionals (who will be invited to stay on for some CPD in the afternoon).

We are taking this years 'Big Draw' as our theme.
We'll be 'drawing with sound'.
The soundscapes we'll be creating are based on landscapes - urban, rural, and coastal.
Alex is going to record the music we play so it can be used as a soundtrack.

For more information, see http://www.soundfoundationsomerset.org.uk/event/music-making-workshop-with-count-me-in/

Half term music making opportunity

Please spread the word - there are still places available on these excellent workshops  for young people with disabilities (12 and over). Siblings, parents and extended families welcome too!
The workshops will be run by Alex, Russ, Geoff and Jane from the Heart Beats / Count Me In team.

Hearts, Beats, Music

Wow, what an amazing team!
Its been a total joy working with you all .....
Geoff
Russ
Alex
Ben
Mark
Martha
Emma
Leah
Elin
Ros
Iona
Sophia
Declan

Here's a wish for lots more music, for all of us, later.

Heart Beats at FosseWay School

Here's Emma and Geoff posing in front of the Heart Beats bunting. Day one of two days for Fosse Way School went well .... lots of engagement, good attention and interaction, and some excellent feedback from staff there.

Tomorrow, our workshop there is the final day of our outreach phase and the last workshop of our Youth Music funded project. What a journey this has been.
Amazing.

We're back in September thanks to some funding from the Big Lottery.

More schools.

We were playing more Heart Beats music with very young people at Three Ways yesterday.
Geoff played his didgeridoo and demonstrated how the sound comes from the inside of a djembe. Because it was such a hot day we played gentle, relaxing sounds.

And here is a lovely letter from Critchill School, where we did some after-school club sessions.
It's a privilege to work with so many young people. The music is different, every time.

This Thursday - off to Fairfield Farm College for what I suspect might be some high-energy fun.

Deserts!

At our last session lots of people said they wanted to do 'guitars' this time.

We've been thinking hard about this one ..... because Geoff said 'African blues' too... so tonight's theme is...
DESERTS!
 First off, African desert blues (thanks for the inspiration, Tinariwen)
 Then, some low down Tex - Mex musical dualling in a dusty desert landscape.
We're just loading up with every guitar we can lay our hands on, plus a big bag of plectrums.
Get out of my way, tumbleweed. Here we come.

Heart Beats improvisation, February 2012

Alex recorded some of our session last week. You can listen to some of music by clicking on this link:

https://soundcloud.com/heart-beats-5/heart-beats-long-improvisation

Everyone is playing along on different instruments. Geoff is playing the didgeridoo - it sounds like a whale! We know Mark can make really good whale noises too, but he is playing the dun dun, the foundation drum.
The lovely sound at the start is Martyn on the 'boom tubes' - a home made instrument.
Emma is playing the steel pan which sounds really bright.
Daryl is playing chime bars.
David and Andrew are playing percussion. Daniel is on guitar.

We called this piece of music 'spring is coming'.

Keep yourself warm with Heart Beats this winter

Never mind the snow, the wind, the rain, the frost .... come and keep warm with Heart Beats this winter.
We have a session this Thursday, November 15th - another one on November 29th - and our final meeting of 2012 on December 13th.

On December 13th we'll throw open the doors and have another Heart Beats tea party - Mums, Dads, sisters, brothers, friends, carers all welcome. Come and create a musical winter wonderland.
We'll have hot drinks and mince pies too.

If you are worried about the weather on any of these dates and would like to check if we're going ahead, please either
TEXT 07522 982574
or
EMAIL info@heartbeats.org.uk

Geoffrey - a Heart Beats team member

This is Geoffrey - a team member of Count Me In and a volunteer for the Heart Beats sessions.
Geoff says 'I live in Glastonbury and I play music. My instruments are djembe, melodeon and didgeridoo. I learn music by listening to it. My other interests are painting and travelling to countries that take part in the Eurovision Song Contest.'