Been delivering a fair amount of workshops this term, as well as being busy running new promotion Rea River Soul, last venture was a success, lots of great feedback – woop! The promotion game is a tiring one when you’re work full time, most of us do and I shan’t complain! An eventful/Creative Partnerships project [...]
workshops
The Waiting Room
Harborne Academy‘s waiting room transformed: We faced several drawbacks, people not understanding the ideas of our transformed space, (especially older groups), some said there was not enough seating, some didn’t like it, but we quickly we addressed their concerns, and resolved any issues. We had a lot of positive feedback on the whole. The making [...]
Music tech-ing
After a fairly quiet summer, I am back on the hustle in the community music world. I am delivering music tech workshops for All Change and Create Arts in Islington and Camden which promises to be challenging and fun. The All Change project is called ‘Fast Forward’, working with young people living in Islington estates, [...]
Down Your Way Planning
Today I went to Castle Vale to start planning the ‘Down Your Way’ project with Dave (artistic director), Ian, Nicola (our coordinator) and Chris. It was really nice to be in a space where we could share and trial exercises for our workshops, this was the first time I had completed such an exercise with [...]
Down Your Way
I have been invited to work as one of 3 lead artists for a Sound it Out project called ‘Down Your Way’. We’re in the preliminary stages at the moment and will have a planning session this week. I was keen to sign up because of it being an intergenerational heritage and music project. I [...]
CBSO Planets Creative Project
I have been working with students from Holyhead School over the last 2 weeks to compose songs inspired by Holst’s The Planets. All students went to a CBSO performance of it a few weeks ago, this was our composition stimuli. At the start of the workshops I gave participants the option to compose about planets [...]
Birmingham Jazz Youth Sessions
This weekend I have been working with lovely students from Hamstead Hall School to compose, arrange and perform an original piece of music. It had a fusion of reggae, bashment and jazz. Most students had never played in a band before so were pretty nervous- but everyone did a great job- although I fluffed some [...]
Beatheadz Project @ Symphony Hall
So the project has rapidly drawn to a close and I feel quite sad. The young people I worked with were really lovely and I got goose pimples listening to the tracks they produced in such a short space of time. Some of my favourites: 4hero inspired, chatty Tbrat’s and a rock influenced groove. We [...]
Spring Sunshine and Happy Beat Making
I had a really lovely time making beats at THSH with some lovely teenagers this morning. I am running two intensive music tech/songwriting sessions for Birmingham City Council and so far it has been great fun! I was really impressed by the speed in which participants were able to use new music software; most had [...]
Gigbeth Music Project Oct ’07
I have been working on a music project organised by (Learning Skills Council funded) Gigbeth festival. We are assisting young Brummies with music compositions that are to be showcased in the opening ceremony on Digbeth High St- 1st November. We were set the task of producing a quality end product, preferably several in just 4 [...]