Sunday 24th April - Another week goes by

The weather's been cold and tricksy this week - sitting inside in the sun, you would think that it was a lovely day out there, but the reality is it has been COLD. I've been caught out a few times, and then, a few times, I've dug out my winter lined trousers and worn a vest and then BOILED.

I suppose that's what Spring is all about... I stand at the back door looking down the garden to the bench and table under the bare branches of the apple tree... time was when we would sit under the shade of the tree drinking chilled white wine and eating tapas and pretending we were somewhere more Mediterranean.

Anyway, here are about four posts all rolled into one - you can either read it all in one go, or practice some self-restraint and make it last.

So, what have we been up to? He hoovered the house Everywhere, and changed the filters and cannula on my oxygen machine.... We changed the sheets on the bed.... I cleaned the luvverly loo... - you know, houseworky stuff.

I wrestled (and lost) with a Goldberg Variation (just look at those time signatures - is that some kind of a JOKE? and he swaps them over every so often just for another laugh)

On Wednesday the children kept dropping the extremely expensive also xylophones so I bought some "tub-trugs" for carting the instruments from the school to the village hall next door where their lessons take place. They were too small for the xylophones, but just right for disinfecting two dozen recorders every week. So, on Friday, I bought another three larger ones. No expense spared. And a glove puppet for a big Whole School Samba Event that I will be involved in later this term. I'm hoping that the puppet will be able to teach two-and three- year-olds how to play samba. Maybe. Maybe not.

  

Today, one of the cats was all pestering and restless. I wondered if we had forgotten to give them breakfast. We had, but that wasn't the problem. Nope. She wanted us to go down to the bottom of the garden to make sure there were no dragons. Both cats are suffering at the moment as there are some new fierce cats around. Not for no reason is one of our cats nick-named Fraidy-Cat.

Anyway, it was briefly warm enough for us to go and do a bit of gardening. Himself to scare the "lawn" with a a savage looking rake mounted on two wheels which you pull and push and clank around with, accumulating piles of dead grass and moss. I think this is the first time we have subjected the grass to this treatment ever. I hope it appreciates the effort.

I carried on digging up the ground under the laurel hedge and replanted a couple more pots of bulbs in the hope that they will joyously burst into life again next Spring. The ones I dumped in the earth a week or so ago don't look too shabby

 
So I am remaining hopeful for these narcissi (and one stray tulip)

They were truly lovely earlier this year.

The garden is full of blue-bells this year - I didn't plant them, so how did they get here?

Anyway, after all that effort we deserved a cup of tea and cake. The actual cake we had with the cup of tea has gone, but I made another one for the photograph. I doubt it will last very long...

Melt 30g (a 1cm slice) of butter in a large mug in the microwave. Beat in an egg, 2 tablespoons brown sugar, 2 tablespoons cocoa powder, 2 tablespoons SR flour, 2 tablespoons porridge oats. Add a drop of milk if the mixture is stiff. The recipe that this is based on says cook for 1 minutes 20 seconds on high in an 800W microwave. Ours is more powerful, and I find 1 min is about right. This makes a sort of brownie-cakey sort of thing. And it takes about the same time as the tea takes to brew.

I use a large plastic mug which is really meant for heating soup.

N-i-c-e.

Right. Himself, in his role of House-Manager is preparing tonight's supper (curry) and I ought to get this dining room table clear. It is covered in raps and chants at the moment, part of the planning for the Great Samba Project, There's "creative disorder", and "work-in-progress". And then there's "what-a-mess".

Friday 8th November - Mugged by Music

I'm not going to have anything useful or interesting to say tonight. My brain is non-functional, my head is full of noise, my mind is concentrated out and totally out of focus. Why?

Today I have taught all day, from 9:45am through to 6:45pm. There have been a few short breaks; 15 minutes for lunch, 30 minutes for clearing admin and talking through issues arising from the lessons, and 30 minutes for travel home and make a cup of coffee.

9:45 through to 12:25 was exam practices, working with small groups of children, accompanying their music exam pieces and teaching them their aural tests. Oh, and it was "Wet Play" at lunchtime.

After lunch I taught the Recorder Ensemble - 20 children playing descant, treble and tenor recorders. We started working on "Silent Night" in readiness for the Carols-by-Candlelight concert early in December. It's a little way to go before it sounds beautiful - at the moment playing the right notes and  the right rhythms are the priorities.

Then a new samba group. Samba can bring out the worst (wild behaviour, egging each other on to be Very Silly) or the best (intent focus and concentration, listening and determination) in the children. This lot are looking, and therefore sounding, good already.

Finally four more recorder groups, including three young beginner groups crammed into a single hour, and I was grateful for a break!

Once I was home, I just had three more lessons to go; a talented young pianist working on Grieg's Notturno, (There are lots of recordings on youtube but this is a good one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpU-gnkIFRo).


Geirangerfjord, Møre og Romsdal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fjord

Then there was a Grade 5 theory student who was reeling with tiredness after a hard week, and a violin candidate with his exam coming up very soon.

Each lesson demands total concentration; listening, watching, analysing, managing, encouraging, nipping trouble in the bud, strength of personality to maintain control in various proportions depending on whether I am teaching one mature student, or thirty lively youngsters.





SO I was grateful for my husband offering to buy instant food for supper - zip, zap and ping - and preparing it, and serving it, and clearing it away. What a lovely man.

Wednesday 1st August - Planning the First Samba Course

This has been a real slog through the paperwork, but I think I'm about there now.

Dates - sorted
Venue - booked
Flyers - err; two errors on the first run, so will have to reprint.
Session planning - complete
Public Liability Insurance - sorted (I'm a member of the Incorporate Society of Musicians which provides this as part of the membership package)
Risk Assessment - sorted
Costs - after a lot of heart searching, some research, and several changes of mind, fixed

this image, and the one above, from www.themusicjungle.co.uk
copyright themusicjungle.co.uk

Now all I have to do is hope and pray that some children actually come!

Sunday 8th July - Fantasy project no 1 is now REAL!

As I posted earlier, my hours, from one of my various jobs, have been substantially reduced for the next school year. There are various reasons for this, most of which I know, many of which I accept, and some which make me speechless with fury, but - hey - that's how it is going to be, and so I have to "move on".

And "move on" is what I have done. I now have a "junk" samba kit, right beside me, cluttering up the space which is facetiously known as "the dining room". I can't remember when we last ate a meal at the table, but that;'s another story. There are enough "instruments" for over 30 people to have a thoroughly enjoyable time together playing authentic samba rhythms.

I am launching as a samba workshop provider NOW. The first school outing for the "junk" kit takes place tomorrow afternoon. There are surdo drums, home-made mallets (you can find instructions on how to do ANYTHING these days), tamborims, ganzas, claves, and even agogo bells all created from from bought and scavenged bits and pieces, and yards and yards of duct tape. I'm really pleased with the sound that the substitute instruments make. It's proof that all those weird looks I was getting while tapping and testing everything in garden centres, cookshops and junk shops all around the area were well worth it.

In due course I will buy a 15-player primary school kit, so that schools and groups have a chance to compare the sounds of the authentic and the "junk" instruments, and see how they could  make their own kits. I suspect that "junk" is where many samba bands started from originally; people searching for whatever would make a good sound, and joining together just for the joy of playing together.
 
Meanwhile, my "junk" kit is here - suitable for primary schools, youth groups, social groups (it's all light-weight) and church groups (let's give Psalm 150 a good work-out!)

Learning to play in a samba band is also a great way to focus on team-building and collaborative skills in business - no team-work, no samba....

So, if there is anyone out there in the West Sussex area (England!) who wants a samba workshop - contact me - leave a comment below, and I'll get back to you.

I'll launch formally on my music website www.themusicjungle.co.uk over the summer, but You heard it Here first!

Sunday 8th July 2012 - Rhythm and the Soul

All this week I have been obsessed with developing my "junk" samba kit. It is ready for use now - just as well, as it gets its first school trial tomorrow with two year 4 classes. More on the samba kit in another post...

Why do drums energise me? Why do I get so excited at the sound of drums - marching drums, djembes, bodruans, samba, taiko?

I came across this sound clip http://neuropoetry.tumblr.com/post/10575321089/a-recording-of-a-semantron-calling-monastics-to

thanks to a link to this blog below from a retweet of a tweet. It's not a blog I have looked at before, but that's one of the joys of twitter http://alastairadversaria.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/links-and-jottings-2/ and I include the link just to acknowledge the source.


Here is the wikipedia link to find out more about the instrument that made that extrodinary sound, called a semantron: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantron

I found this picture at http://russianbells.com/history/history2.html
which gives an idea of how the sound was produced.

And here are some YouTube links
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JRvJAIr7Vc&feature=related


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zS4ZOQAnpzI

It makes me wonder about the connection between rhythm and soul and spirit - all words with musical meaning, but also with religious connotations.

All the children that I have worked with over three years of teaching djembe and samba have totally bought into the group satisfaction of being part of a cohesive group - either all playing the same thing, or else meeting the challenge of layering up complex rhythmic patterns.

It seems to me that the rhythm of the drum calls to something deep within our unconscious.

(Bagpipes, played well, also do it for me - but not for everyone!)

Sunday 1st July - when fantasy becomes a reality

Today, the final pieces in the project fell into place. I had been cast down into despair, because it was looking as though the set up costs for starting out as a samba teacher would be more than I was happy to part with.

However, a comment by a music teacher colleague started me thinking, and then, at midnight last night (apologies for waking you, my love), I had the brainwave, the inspiration, that has made it all possible after all.


I am SOOOOO excited! Here is the first stage of getting the gear together;





There is still a huge amount to do;



easy stuff - sourcing and buying the missing bits that I couldn't find today

boring but essential stuff - deciding how much I should charge, creating sensible accounts, checking my exisiting public liability insurance policy

fun stuff  - the designs for publicity material, stickers, T shirts etc

scary stuff - buying the rest of the equipment (about £700)

brand new learning stuff - making half a dozen surdo mallets

knuckle down and get on with it stuff - workshop plans, backup materials, hand outs

real stuff - advertising, looking for bookings, doing some trial runs (I have the youth at church in my sites as unsuspecting guinea pigs).




I shall launch on www.themusicjungle.co.uk as soon as everything is in place, ready for next term. Meanwhile, I'll keep you updated on progress.

Sunday 24th June - Fantasy Project number 1

This isn't really fantasy project number one - really more like number 1001. But it is travelling more briskly through the highways and byways of creating plans, researching, comparing prices,
feasibility planning.

Here's a clue;

I'm not sure that it will ever come to anything. Most of my projects just fizzle (seen any additions to the knitting project recently? no? QED).

Travelling hopefully is often very much better than arriving at reality.

But next year I will have very much less work than I have now, and I could do with finding something fun, energising and preferably remunerative to fill the empty hours.

Or I could just stay at home get on with gardening, housework, DIY. That's a really horrible thought.

Friday 20th April - Simple Samba

Friday afternoons are one of several high spots in my week. That's when, amongst other lessons which I also enjoy, I teach five-week short course of samba. You'd think it would be tedious, starting a new group every five weeks - back to the basics again, and again, and again, with yet another fresh group of twenty children.

Not a bit of it!

How could I get bored when the children are having such fun! There is something greatly satisfying about making a huge amount of noise, all together, on purpose, with a purpose, for a purpose. It reminds me of how much I used to enjoy the sound of breaking glass when I used to chuck stones at the few remaining panes of glass in our greenhouse when I was about that age (of course, I stopped doing that when the greenhouse was repaired and put back into operation. Pity, that. Spoiled my fun, rather.)

Anyway, back to the present moment.

It is so easy to build something impressive from a simple start; take a catchy rhythm - this time we are using "Here comes a samba, here we are!" - and belt it out on a mixture of surdo drums, agogo bells, ganzas (shakers) and tamborins (a small hand drum that you whack with a stick). You can hear us at the other end of the school - how lucky all the other pupils and teachers are to be able to listen to us having such a great time.

Seriously, samba is A Very Good Thing. The children who lack confidence find that they can keep the rhythm and follow the breaks; the children who are over confident find that they do actually have to concentrate or it all goes pear-shaped, the children who tend to be a bit hyper and act as the class clowns manage to tone down their behaviour in order to get their chance on the Really Big Drum. Forty minutes of belting out the rhythm on various different instruments leaves them punch-drunk from the noise, energised and yet exhausted from the effort of staying focused for the whole session. I have no idea what happens when they rejoin their class, and how happy their class teacher is to receive them back again - I can hear them samba-ing all the way down the corridor so maybe they've got it out of their system by the time they get back to class?

Roll on next Friday. Here comes a samba - here we are!