Saturday 14th July - The ticking clock

The "normal" pattern of my teaching schedule requires a certain amount of stamina and organisation, but is achievable because it quickly settles into a pattern. I travel around the county delivering class music lessons often based on a particular instrument under the "Wider Opportunities in Music" programme.

Each lesson will incorporate singing, rhythm and pulse games, listening to music and learning to play the instrument. There will be between twenty and thirty-five children in each class, ranging in age between 7 and 11 years old.

Monday; C clarinets, keyboards, treble recorders.
Tuesday; keyboards and djembes,
Wednesday; djembe, B flat clarinets and a trumpet, more djembes.
Thursday; samba, class music and two groups of recorders,
Friday; samba and four groups of recorders.

Add to the daily list a selection from (depending on what I am teaching in each lesson); guitar, ukulele, laptop, hefty amplifier, maybe some extra percussion instruments, and the car is soon pretty well solidly filled, leaving just the driver seat free.

And don't forget the planning folder, spare clarinet reeds, song books, sheet music, admin letters to hand out, mp3 player, memory stick, mobile phone and packed lunch!

It's no wonder that at some point the organisation gives way and I find that I have scattered my possessions across the length and breadth of the county - my planning folder abandoned at one school, my coat at another, my mobile phone forgotten on the dining room table, my lunch box in a staff room kitchen....

Most evenings I also teach piano for up to three hours. The change from whole class teaching to individual tuition may be easier in terms of "behaviour management" but still requires intense listening and concentration.

So, to sit here, on a Saturday morning, in a quiet, music-free space is a real joy. I can almost feel my ears relaxing as I listen to the gentle ticking of the clock, and the subdued tapping of fingers on computer keys (mine on the lap-top, Best-Beloved on the PC nearby).

Saturday 14th July - Sweet little gadget

What have we here? It's a sort of pen thingy, but the business end is a soft rubber "nib" which works like a finger on the touch screen of my phone.

Suddenly, I can compose ("technical" term; I have always used the word "write" for literature and "compose" for music, but, thinking about it, perhaps they are interchangeable?) emails and blog entries on my phone with a staggering reduction of typos, and consequently a staggering improvement my general good humour and use of language (verbal language, while typing).

Howzat!

And another new skill while I'm at it; I started to make this entry on 14th July, but got distracted. So today is really the 21st July, but I have discovered how to tamper with the evidence and post this entry as though it really is the 14th July. Oho, I have power over time itself. Heady stuff.

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!)

Friday 6th July - Labyrinthine Days

10 m (33 ft) high fountain of Pāhoehoe lava, Hawaii, United States
picture from wikipedia

At this stage of the term, all my schedules and diaries and calendars go into meltdown.


The regular pattern of my days and weeks disintegrates into a stew of harum-scarum ingredients to be fitted in wherever possible; school concerts, instrument inventory checks, extra piano lessons (I usually enter around half a dozen students who often need extra lessons as the reality of the exam draws ever closer), and exam appointments (I accompany about twenty - thirty instrumental exam candidates who all need rehearsal slots). Add a seasoning of routine blood tests, optician appointments and visits to collect glasses, an unplanned trip to the vet etc etc and the schedules become unmanageable.



I have given up on the diary function on my mobile phone, and stopped using the excel spreadsheet that I use to schedule piano lessons. The only way I can deal with the last couple of weeks of term and the shifting quicksands of the appointments is with a written schedule that I can alter (IN PENCIL) at a moment's notice. And then rub it out and change it again.
Technology just doesn't function as effectively as paper when the chips are well and truly down.

Labyrinth at Meis, Galicia, possibly from the Atlantic Bronze Age
picture from wikipedia

Sometimes I feel as though I am being dragged, kicking and screaming, through a maze


but it is actually only a labyrinth.

There is ultimately just the one path through each day with no dead ends, no false trails.

I just have to begin at the beginning, and follow the path through to the end.

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.