Music for Alice

Our workshops wouldn't be the same without the instruments we've bought with funding from Music for Alice.
Read more about how their funding has helped us on their website here

Tonight....

Hey folks, it's HeartBeats tonight!
Russ is off to the farm to get all those lovely instruments.

Music For Alice

We love getting letters - they are quite rare these days, it's nearly always emails.
So it was doubly lovely that when Music for Alice sent a cheque through to us - their grant to AllStars for some new instruments - it came with a hand-written note on the back of a postcard.
This is the postcard :

Chet Baker and his band. How cool is that.
Thank you, Music for Alice.
Anyway, time to get shopping - we have a list ...

Community matters ... please support us if you shop in Waitrose

Vote for us in Waitrose!

If you shop in the Wells branch of Waitrose in September please can you remember to put your green token in the HEART BEATS MUSIC CLUB slot...

We'd like to say thanks to Waitrose for agreeing to raise funds for us. The more tokens we get, the larger share we'll get of the £1000 they donate to local good causes every month.

We would like to spend the money on new instruments. Please tell your friends and family to support us. Every token will help.

Recruiting - come to our taster sessions

This Thursday, June 18th, we have the second of our AllStars taster sessions.
Do you know someone who'd like to come?

At our first taster on June 4th we had a full room  - with a mixture of old and new faces. Lots of old friends meeting up, with plenty of giggling and happiness.
The Heart Beats crew showed the new people how things went and how we run the session.
We went from laughter to quiet listening; exploring all sorts of sound and enjoying the new instruments.

Ryan said 'It's nice to be see everyone back - and to have new instruments.' Everyone liked the sound of the harp and hammered dulcimer together.
Ellie said 'what a fantastic group.'
Bella said 'thanks for being so welcoming.'

Martyn brought his new guitar along.
Katie had her trusty ukelele, and Geoff, his melodeon.
Mark enjoyed playing the new dun dun.
Looks like we might have some fun coming up....

Three more tasters to come:
June 18th
July 16th
July 30th

- all at Wells Museum lecture hall, 6 - 8.
Spread the word.

Good news for Heart Beats

This week we heard that the Radstock Co-operative society are going to give us a generous donation. They say this is 'to aid in the positive work you do'.

We're really pleased about this. We are going to spend this money on some new instruments because we feel this will benefit everyone for a long time in the future.

2014

Yes! time to make some noise!
Now we've all put our tinsel back in the attic, it's time to dust off the instruments and gather together again.
Here's the dates for the first part of 2014 :

1.   Jan 9th 

2.   Jan 23^rd

3.   Feb 6^th

4.   Feb 27^th

5.   Mar 13^th

6.   Mar 27^th

We start again after Easter on April 24^th

Come and join us for tunes, rhythms, songs, musical games, fun, tea, cake and all the rest.... Wells Museum at 6.00 this Thursday.

Count Me In are leading some experiential training for Sound Foundation Somerset....

Breaking news....


Fantastic Professional Development Opportunity for Somerset Music Practitioners!

Sound Foundation Somerset (Somerset’s Music Education Hub) and Somerset County Council’s Short Breaks are funding a great professional development opportunity for music practitioners in Somerset.

This is for people who work with children and young people with disabilities, learning and communication needs and who are interested in developing their music leading skills.


Supported by SPAEDA Arts Education, and delivered by Count Me In, this experiential learning opportunity includes two mornings of live music workshops based on structured, improvised group music making.

Practitioners will participate in these workshops and learn to lead a group of children and young people with disabilities, learning and communication needs.

Afternoon sessions focus on learning and professional development, with practitioners reflecting, planning and reviewing the workshops.


Thursday 20th and Friday 21st February 2014


Great Bow Wharf, Bow Street, Langport, TA10 9PN


9.30am – 12.30pm- workshop for 12 years +


Lunch – for Count Me In and CPD Participants


1.30-3.30pm CPD element for emerging practitioners



Call: 01458 254265 to book your practitioner place.
Only five free CPD places available

Heart Beats at the term time clubs in Somerset

Count Me In are bringing a taste of Heart Beats to the Short Breaks term time clubs - for children and young people with disabilities in Somerset - on Saturday Sept 21st, and Saturday October 26th.
This is part of six weekly sessions. Only £5 per session, or book six get one free! There's other activities on offer too - sculpture, and film.
For more information:
short breaks term time clubs

or contact Sarah at Spaeda, 01458 254 262

Outreach hits FMU!!!

Ears still buzzing and heart still thumping after an awesome music-and-sound-charged start to our outreach season at Openstorytellers 'FMU' club.
Thanks for hosting guys!
Great welcome, nice dancing, good playing.
Thanks to our awesome team - Martha, Geoff, Mark, Elin and Roo - great leading. It's a joy to work with you all.

Next up : after shcool club at Fosseway school this week.
Session at Threeways School in Bath.
Session at Penrose School in Bridgwater.
Two sessions at Fosseway school holiday club.

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.

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.

chimes

Hooray, a BIG box arrived today - full of bass and alto chime bars - bliss......

Alex's new drum

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

Heart Beats news

It's so great to be underway with this fabulous project - another fine session last Thursday.
Lots going on!
We're putting our evaluation strategy to the test, with a visit from our evaluator Nell to the session last week.
The trainees Iona and Sophia have had their induction session and are ready to rock'n'roll.
Musician in residence Declan is now a fully fledged team member. Thanks for the great song last week Declan!
I'm visiting our partner project SOUNDSCAPES to sit in on their 'improvisation' taster session next week.
We're organising our parallel mini-series of workshops which we hope will happen at Critchill school in Frome.
We're plotting and planning our Professional Development day which will happen in late spring / early summer. We've got our eyes on someone really good to lead this day, and there will be a few places for sale .... more info to follow soon.
And, last but not least, we're starting to wonder about how to spend out equipment grant from the Somerset Community Foundation. Mmmm - lots of nice things out there. Send us your ideas.
Russ wants : a steel pan...
I want: big fat chime bars....
What do you want?

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!

some of our instruments

Here are some of our instruments.
People coming to Heart Beats will be given a chance to help choose which new instruments to buy with our Somerset Community Foundation Funding.
Shopping! Sounds good. Don't miss the fun.

Funding for equipment - good news

We can now add this logo to our blog thanks to a kind offer of funding from the Somerset Community Foundation.
They are helping us to purchase some new music equipment especially for Heart Beats. So when you come along we'll have a chat about what instruments you think we should chose.

BREAKING NEWS

Very excited and pleased this afternoon, we've had a very positive response from the Somerset Community Foundation regarding a funding application for some extra equipment ....more news on this to follow .... soon.
More stuff - more music - more fun - can't be bad!