How to end - part two : Twelfth Night at the Globe

Throughout the AllStars project, Alex and Jane have been running the Listening Lounge - monthly music mentoring sessions with a mixed group of SEN/D musicians and music students / Graduate Music Assistants.

This safe, small and exploratory group have been integral to the delivery of the project. Ideas for workshops have been investigated and developed. We've chatted, played together, and used all sorts of approaches to interactive improvisation.

We've invented games, written songs, experimented with graphic scores, art and sound, iPads apps, voices, and lots of surprising ideas.

This summer Alex has been in London a lot, as the drummer in the band for Emma Rice's production of Twelfth Night at the Globe Theatre.... ' the Summer of Love' season. We'd spent our session last month exploring drama and music, learning about the play, and impersonating the characters. Josh identified with 'Count Cappuccino' and Hannah, Sir Toby Belch. Lots of laughs, and some serious playing.

The Globe Theatre

The stage

It seemed obvious that our last Listening Lounge session should be a visit to the Globe Theatre.

a warm day...

So - off we went on the hottest day of the year!  It was an adventure, and a long day, but with Russ at the wheel it was a smooth journey.

a full house

Celebrity!

Our seats were in the upper gallery. We had a good view of the play and the musician's gallery and managed a couple of celebrity waves at the drummer.

The play, the music and the atmosphere were completely unforgettable. Lots of humour, with top class musicianship and singing from the cast.

As we drove back west we were treated to a spectacular sunset over Stonehenge and Salisbury plain.

A colourful end to a special day, and a vibrant end to a special piece of work.

HeartBeats summer party

One more session before our summer break.
We're meeting at the Lawrence Centre for some great music on Thursday July 14th - this week.

There will be pizza and treats, and we're being joined by Anna Golding who will lead some movement  and dance for us.

See you there.

animated improvisation

Unexpected things can happen at the Listening Lounge .....Here's an improvisation inspired by St Patricks' Day, played by the one-and-only Esther on the harp. Animations by Josh. Dancing and laughter by everyone.

Joining In.....

Today there's a headful of ideas whirling around, that have been sparked off as we plan the final details of our 'Joining In' training day.
This Saturday, we'll be taking a load of ideas and showing how we turn them into MUSIC - why we do this - and why it's such a joy.

making music with new friends.....

Playing music together is an age-old way to develop friendships.
Heart Beats aims to give young people physical, emotional and social confidence, whilst having a good time.
We do what we can to evaluate the success of this, but sometimes you get something come through that reminds you it's all on track.
Today I got sent this lovely spontaneous endorsement, a poster made by one of the group.
Making music with new friends....yes.

The music team - trainee volunteers

We're lucky to have two fantastic trainee volunteers with us at every Heart Beats session.
Following in the illustrious footsteps of Sophia, Iona, Elin and Ros, we now have Wells Cathedral school students Gemma and Vicky with us for the year.
This placement is an opportunity for them to gain experience of music leading, and for the Heart Beats crew to learn from them.
Last week they added in what was probably the first ever funk riff on French horn and recorder!
Go Gemma and Vicky!

Gemma with Martyn

         

Vicky with Martina and Andrew

Planning for the Heart Beats party on July 4th

Here's some of the crew taking a break, having a banana and helping to plan the party we're having on July 4th. mmmm... looks like hard work to me.

And here's our wonderful trainees, Elin and Roo .... looking... wonderful.

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.

MUSE

I'm excited to have come across the MUSE project yesterday whilst doing my 'other' job.
Here's their website
They seek to ' empower young, disabled musicians by helping them challenge any barriers to musical participation that they may experience. '
They are working across the SW region with Youth Music funding at the moment.
Really exciting stuff.

Themes

One great thing about being a music leader is that you get to work with themes. And because we're not bound to any curriculum our themes can be as diverse as we want - there's mileage to be had in all sorts of ideas -  and learning and fun too.
Themes of the week include :
journeys
colours
space jumps
spaceman dub
beginnings /endings
strange celestial roads .....

Early years music

It's great to see Frome early years music leader Willow Harwood has been awarded some funding for instruments through a Youth Music initiative.
Willow contributes her bit of wisdom to an online resource on Youth Musics' Network blog. Click here for the Youth Music resources page.
Some of the 'top tips' hold good for our work too. 
Willow says "Ensuring a mix of adult led and child initiated music making builds confidence in even the youngest of music makers."

In our project, we make music with young adults, but we value scaffolding and sound support as the foundation for confidence building too.
Heart Beats really appreciates the funding that enables us to have a good, solid team of music leaders, trainees, support worker, volunteer and musician in residence .... it's a great way to work.

Alex's new drum

Here's Alex showing everyone his new Udu drum .... great sound.

Rrrrrooooock band evening!

On October 11th our Heart Beats session will be different.
James and Paul from Soundscapes - our partner project - will be coming with loads of new stuff to run a 'rock band' evening for us.
Everyone can have a go at playing electric music together, with drum kit too.
The times are different too - 7 o'clock to 9 o'clock.
Woo hoo.

Embrace Create Connect

Russ and Jane have just returned from the learning disability arts conference in Leicester - Embrace, Create, Connect.
We went there in a team with our friends from Openstorytellers.
This was a really well organised event - stimulating, challenging, friendly, varied, exciting. We've spoken to so many people and connected with lots of ideas. There's a lot of dance and theatre-based stuff out there : not enough music, though - we'd love to run a presentation if this event happens again.
Outstanding for us was the crew from Sage Gateshead, representing their programme Community Music Sparks. This is a picture of Andrew and Michael, who had us dancing in the aisles.
Our dream is to pay them a visit - see their team in action, share some ideas, get some top class CPD.
Is Gateshead a long way from Somerset? mmmm.

Instruments

People are getting in touch and offering us instruments they have but no longer play. Isn't that amazing? Pass this good idea on!