How to end - part one : the Giant Jam

How to end AllStars music? Starting in the spring of 2015, the delivery phase has ended now - we will spend the next months reflecting, planning and evaluating - taking a breath before new things roll out.

Even in the early planning phase of AllStars we knew we'd want to mark the end of the work well.
Finishing can be difficult; it's one of the recurring themes of funded work. We knew we wanted to say goodbye with optimism and a sense of achievement.

We planned an end-of-project festival. With additional financial support from the Big Lottery and their perfectly-timed 'Celebrate' fund, we were able to put on an event that brought our community of young and SEN/D musicians together.

Beautifully put together by Ben, our pastoral support worker, and Jade, our admin star, the Giant Jam festival was organised in consultation with a team of party planners from the Heart Beats group.

Frome Street Bandits

Art Box bunting

The Gaint Jam was held at the Ammerdown Conference Centre - a beautiful garden alive with flowers and bees.
The sun shone all day.

Bands played outdoors and in the 'main stage room',  a transformed space with underwater decor borrowed from a local festival organiser and excellent sound equipment provided by our project partners SRYP.

The main stage room

A dance workshop, Loops disco and four live bands made it a real festival.
Festival goers enjoyed a performance from an inclusive choir, a ukelele workshop, a drum circle,  an art workshop, free massage, interactive storytelling from Openstorytellers,

Smiling gate crew

Relaxing massage

Live music workshops

outdoor games, wood fired pizzas, and an array of treats supplied by the brand new catering van from Critchill SEN school.

An outdoor improvisation workshop showcased the talents of the Heart Beats group and involved lots of new people too.

An amazing team of stewards and volunteers  made the day safe, fun and accessible for everyone.

Stewards and volunteers

We even got a slot on BBC Points West.

The Giant Jam brought all sorts of people together - it was inter-generational, inclusive and really enjoyable.

We're glad that the AllStars project, which has united so many diverse musicians, could end on such a bright note and a beautiful day.

DartsFest

We are starting to plan our own festival, to be held next year, to celebrate the end of our project.

Have a look at this one - DartsFest .
It's a 2 day festival created with the needs of people with learning disabilities in mind.

It's near Exeter if you're thinking of going. 

A fantastic 2-day festival created with the needs of people with learning disabilities in mind. Live music, workshops, accessible facilities and more. - See more at: http://www.ahsw.org.uk/diary.aspx?id=1885#sthash.RSMs1aBN.dpufa

A fantastic 2-day festival created with the needs of people with learning disabilities in mind. Live music, workshops, accessible facilities and more. - See more at: http://www.ahsw.org.uk/diary.aspx?id=1885#sthash.RSMs1aBN.dpuf

A fantastic 2-day festival created with the needs of people with learning disabilities in mind. Live music, workshops, accessible facilities and more. - See more at: http://www.ahsw.org.uk/diary.aspx?id=1885#sthash.RSMs1aBN.dpuf

Gathering ideas for our training day

On Saturday January 30th 2016, the AllStars Music team will be hosting an open-access CPD session for educators who use music and musicians who work in care and education.
The training will focus on developing a person-centered approach to music: unlocking creativity and confidence.
As a team, we have a wide range of SEN/D expertise, so the training will be useful for people who work in SEN/D, or the wider aspects of musical inclusion.

We'll be sharing some of the thinking and practice that informs our work, both in  our inclusive Heart Beats sessions, and also our wider work with schools, mentoring, and using music as a tool for therapy and communication.

As part of the package, we'll be offering linked opportunities for experiential learning through placements at the Heart Beats music group.

At the moment we're gathering ideas for the day, especially thinking about what 'musical inclusion' means and how to create a 'playful' environment.

There will be plenty of playing on the day, so if you want to come, bring an instrument.


Watch this blog for more details. The venue will be in Wells and the day will run from 10.00 - 3.30. Tickets will be available soon.

Creative Minds Conference

Please help spread the word about this conference.

For more details follow this link:
 /http://www.creativemindsproject.org.uk/events/creative-minds-south-west/

Youth Music project .....

Once upon a time Youth Music funded us to start the Heart Beats project. We hoped it would be successful but we didn't expect it to be quite such fun!
Our support from Youth Music draws to a close, as we have now submitted our final report to them.


Count Me In wants to say thanks to them for making Heart Beats happen. And to our other funders and supporters.

We have worked with 144 young people with a range of needs since we began in January 2012.
During this time,we've been surprised, excited, amazed, fascinated and amused.... we've learned more from our participants than we would ever have expected.

Of course, the Good News is that we haven't finished yet - Heart Beats is up and running, and judging from our last session, more fun than ever.

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 - Phase two

Some people have been wondering if they have missed some Heart Beats sessions at Wells.
To make things clear:
Open sessions have stopped now. (We hope they will start again in the autumn - we're waiting for funding news.)
We will have 'open doors' at the Heart Beats project party, on July 4th, 6 - 8 at Wells Museum.
Meanwhile, from now until our Youth music funding ends after the summer, we are running the second phase of the project. This is where we go out and run 'outreach' sessions in schools, holidays clubs and so on.
The first of these is at FMU (Friends meet up) in Frome, on May 11th.
- see www.openstorytellers.org.uk for details.
 So - if you go to FMU, see you there!
Watch the blog for more news about Phase Two.

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'.

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.

A Count Me In session

Here's Russ and Jane playing music with the crew from Six Acres (Taunton) and St James' resource centre (Yeovil ). Every month we'd turn up and support the staff to Make Time for Music.
This project's finished now, but you follow the story on our blog Making Time for Music.

Embrace Create Connect

We're going to this conference! Exciting!
http://www.embracecreateconnect.co.uk/