What's the 'perfect session'?

Last Thursday our Heart Beats group gathered in Cedars Hall for the last session of the AllStars project. The mood was upbeat because we are all looking forward to our festival, the Giant Jam, this Sunday.

AllStars has been a long and complex project, involving many different people across Somerset and beyond. The Heart Beats sessions in Wells have been the core, with 38 sessions since Easter 2015.
Every session has been surprising, fun and different, and last Thursday was no exception.

In reflection, we agreed that it felt like a 'perfect session'.
As often happens, a few folk couldn't be there, but we had a good mix in the room, musicians with disabilities, young music students from Wells Cathedral School and Bath Spa University.

Everyone was relaxed, at home, and full of affectionate chat. Laughter ran round the room.
People choose their instruments with confidence and played them well. Listening was focused, respectful, and there was a plenty of considerate space in the music.
The dynamics of the session grew slowly from playful interaction to upbeat dance groove. The music grew and became bigger than the sum of its parts.

Most importantly, after starting the pieces, the music leaders could step right back and just play as equals. Everyone participated on their own terms, coming together to create a harmonious whole. The music took over.

We parted as friends and in the hope that we will all play together again really soon.
Thanks everyone! A perfect session.

Integration, inclusion - powerful music

What a brilliant session today in Bridgwater - with students from the Jean Rees Centre and Chilton Trinity school coming together to improvise, co-create, and listen.

We can say this was an 'inclusive' session because there was a role for everyone, with open permission to play, listen and be creative. The atmosphere was respectful, playful, and trusting. No one was excluded.

We can also say it was an 'integrated' session because everyone there was bringing different skills to the room. J from Jean Rees taught the Chilton Trinity students some Makaton which they then incorporated in to some conducting. Everyone worked together to craft and perform small pieces of new music.

Some leadership skills emerging

We are running these sessions to explore what happens when you bring peer groups together from different settings, and to see how communication develops with music as the medium.

Well! today certainly had a big warm glow, and the room was full of life affirming sound.

searching and reflecting - a team day

Alex, Jane, Russ and Ben were off over the border to Earlswood in Monmouthshire last week for a team skill share and reflection day. Before we did any speaking we made time for some music - tuning up and tuning in.

Professional development is important to the way we work together. This was a chance to try out some new things and really concentrate on how we play together as well.

Cold enough for woolly hats..

We had lots of fun which must be a good sign!

It was an opportunity to eat cake and discuss the future  - we have lots of ideas for ways to take our work forward, so it all feels positive.

nice sunset!

One idea is to spend more time together reflecting on good practice and inspiration in music leading.... a day didn't feel long enough.

We discussed creating a resource that would help others work in the way that we do.

Close your eyes ... and open your ears

We're continuing with our exploration of the sensory aspects of improvised music.

Yesterday, our group experimented with playing whilst having their eyes shut.

Alex asked us to 'pass a clap' around the group - first with eyes open, and then eyes shut.
The difference was striking! It took us about 3 goes before we began to recognise the unqiue sound of the person next to us and find our place in the sequence.

Later, Jane asked the group to improvise a piece quietly, eyes closed, with no prompts other than a significant sound for 'start' and 'stop'. People were told they could contribute as much or as little to the piece as much as they liked.
Together we created music that had a distinctive atmosphere, shape and sound. It felt complex but respectful.

In feedback, a lot of people said these things were their favourite part of the session.
Geoff said 'our two ears are connected to our brain.'
Without visual input, our sense of listening became much more important.
There is some research that states our brains divert activity away from our visual centres during listening tasks.

In our sessions, especially when there are so many people, we tend to use physical conducting  gestures to sculpt the music -  so this was different.
It is also a way of exploring what it is like to be part of the group for the group member who is visually impaired.
From a music leaders' point of view - it removed the need for active music leading. Perhaps this was possible, and successful, because we've all played together so much already?

As a group activity, it showed us how connected we are to each other, and how we can  feel more relaxed without the need to process visual information.
You might think you become less aware of others if you can't see them : what we felt was that we could listen more clearly, and because of this, become more aware of others.

More exploration of the links between colour, shape and sound

We're still thinking about the wonderful multi sensory world of music ... colour, shape and sound.
Recently at an in-house training day, Hugh Nankivell took us into a world of graphic scores.

This inspired Alex, Josh and Jane to experiment with some 'graphic scores' at the Listening Lounge.

There's a big clock on the wall in the room : tick-tock-tick is always in the background of our music.
We decided to follow the clock and play together for exactly one minute.

Then we sat at the table, chose a colour, and drew a picture representing what we'd played - we had exactly one minute to draw.

Then, we passed our instruments on and had - you guessed! one minute - to make a piece of music together, on our new instruments, by the following the 'shape' our drawing.

Then, we turned the paper around and experimented with playing each others' graphic score.

Finally, we used the amazing Tunetrace app to photograph and play the picture. Tunetrace allows you to photograph drawings which then generates live music.

Make drawings in the real world, photograph them with Tunetrace and hear them transformed into music. - See more at: http://www.qappsonline.com/apps/tunetrace/#sthash.axmltX0J.dpuf

The pot of gold at the end of the rainbow....

Yesterday at the Listening Lounge, after we had done some improvisation together, we talked about the colour of music.
Some people ('synesthetes') see music as colours. We agreed this could certainly enhance your enjoyment of improvisation!
One thing we couldn't quite agree on - was the music we'd made green or yellow?

Here's a video of the magnificent jazz drummer Elvin Jones describing his experience of synesthesia. He says 'not everybody can reach the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow....' but just watching this clip of him enables us to think about music as enrichment. Wonderful.

Click on this link to watch Elvin describe his colourful world of sound:

Elvin Jones and Synesthesia

2016 : cultivating ways for working with music and growing our ideas...

On the other side of New Year we have two events coming up that will help us to cultivate our musical ideas and grow the way we work .... we should emerge inspired, informed and ready to bloom.

On January 30th our team of music leaders - Alex, Jane and Russ, are leading a music inclusion training day for our trainees, associates and other professionals. We're calling this 'Joining In' ... exactly what 'inclusion' means to us.

The following weekend, we have an 'in house' training day with music leader extraordinaire Hugh Nankivell.

What a luxury!
If you know anyone that would like to come to 'Joining In' please email for details.

Running an integrated group.

Our group exists for young people with learning disabilities, but it's a bit more complex than that....
Over the years, we have always had student placements at our music sessions. We provide support and opportunities for young musicians to experience working within a mixed ability setting.

Vicky

It's also brought us into contact with some brilliant instrumentalists and singers who really do bring a sparkle to group improvisations.
We feel that through offering this experience we've helped young people make higher education choices, and perhaps see music differently.

Gemma

Gemma, who was with us for a year, says ... 'I've ended up going to do recorder and violin at Birmingham Conservatoire instead of computer science'. We asked Gemma if she'd be interested in coming back for some sessions : 'This sounds amazing!  I'd love to come back and take part in the sessions!'
With the AllStars project, we felt that we'd like to open out this opportunity and move towards running a more integrated group - bringing together people from different backgrounds, who have had different opportunities, but have a common love of music.

At the taster session

Our partnerships with Wells Cathedral School continues to grow, and we also now have a partnership with the Elmwood and Penrose Federation of schools in Bridgwater.
This year Wells Cathedral School have stepped things up a bit by agreeing to host our integrated music mentoring sessions - "The Listening Lounge" - which begin in September.
They will help us identify A level music students to join the AllStars groups, and we'll be joined by one of their Graduate Music Assistants, who will be at the school studying for a CME (Certificate of Music Education).

Taster session warm up games

At our tasters this summer so far we met have Bella, Ellie, Esther, Molly and Laura. Laura is from Frome and is interested in a career in music therapy ; Molly is a signed songwriter.
Bella, Ellie and Esther are A level music students from Wells Cathedral School.They're all brilliant and we hope they will all join the group!
Our team of music leaders realise we will have a challenge to meet everyone's needs - but that's what we exist for : that's inclusion. We've said we're all stars in this context, so we need to discover how that works, and what that sounds like.
We all have so much to learn from each other, simply by being in a room where we can work and play together, listen and respond on equal terms.
What will be fascinating will be to observe the outcomes of these two years of 'music education by encounter' that we have planned for the AllStars project.

Ahoy there

Ahoy there me hearties ....
This week we will recreate the Sounds of the Sea, ranging from seashell percussion to Hawaiian paradise beach sounds to surf rock .....
Bring your shades. Happily though, it's not Talk Like a Pirate Day yet, so we can relax - a bit.

Music leading

At Heart Beats, we have our own way of music leading -  using agreed signals, body language, and conducting. Sometimes two people can lead at the same time - this needs empathy and a good awareness of your 'leading partner'.
Here's a clip of two of the Heart Beats crew doing some co-leading.
As you can see, it's fun too.

Games at Heart Beats

We often start our sessions with some musical games. This is a short film of a game we play - mirroring. You take turns to lead or copy. When the music stops - don't move! It's fun and relaxing - a great way to loosen up and make connections.

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'.

NEW YEAR, NEW EARS!

Our theme for this week is EXPLORATION.

We're going exploring in Alex and Ben's Spaceship full of new sounds!

We're landing on the Planet '2013' .... bleep bleep ... touching down ... what new music will we hear as we explore this unknown world?

It could sound strange, weird, wild, wonderful, crazy, squeaky, deep, funny ........

Approaching Planet 2013...... fasten your seat belts......

Don't miss the fun! This Thursday, same time, same place. Space food provided.