posted 23 Jan 2012 01:00 by flora peden smith
My work has always been pretty varied, working in different schools, leading 2 community choirs and also leading weekend workshops, and I have been pretty busy since September last year with projects, but spring is here (well, nearly) and it feels as if new ideas are coming to life.
In February I start my "Find your voice" course through 20,000 voices which I am really looking forward to. Please follow the link at the bottom of this blog post to find more information.
I have also been asked by St Wilfred's Church in Newcastle to run a 'Find your voice' one-off workshop on Monday 13th February 10:00 - 11:30.
On Saturday night at my 'Soup&Sing' workshop, Sarah Gray and I were asked if we could organise a "flash-mob" with some parents from a local school that is closing down at the end of this year. Sounds like a great idea - my mind is already full of songs we could do.
I am also looking in to starting a regular Gospel community choir in Alnwick, although at this stage I am looking at my work schedule, as it would have to slot in somewhere and at present, there isn't a lot of space for it - hopefully by the end of this term that situation will have resolved itself.
And finally, I hope to be involved in a songwriting group of children and young adults from across Northumberland, using the Olympics as a theme. Exciting!
|
posted 5 Jan 2012 08:08 by flora peden smith
My goodness, it is 2012 already, and I can see from my last few blogs that I have been neglecting my site...an empty blog is the sign of a busy life, I guess.
And it's back to work next week, although this week has seen me at a full day of training for Whole Class Instrumental Tuition, and an afternoon at one of my favourite schools. Planning for the next term is well under way, with ideas for an African Singing project, a 'through the decades' singing project, a ukuleles and singing project, as well as a new 6 week "Find Your Voice" adult training course.
Reflecting back on last term, with the exciting start of two new choirs - one new children's choir, and one community choir that is just 'new to me', I am sure that this term will be full of fun challenges.
But I am going to cheat a bit and write about something I was part of nearly a month ago now...
At the very end of last term, I was able to make some time to go up to Berwick and lead a vocal projection workshop for A-level drama students. Due to my pretty full timetable, I was only able to fit it in after other projects had ended. The students are studying 'A Midsummers Night's Dream' and will be performing it later. It was great to use voice techniques for singing to improve their own work - and despite the initial embarrassment some of them felt singing their lines, it was wonderful to see the end results. I wish them all the very best in their production!!
So one New Year's resolution might just be... to update my blog more often in 2012!
|
posted 2 Nov 2011 14:25 by flora peden smith
I am currently teaching all over east Northumberland - from Berwick-upon-Tweed and the nearby rural village of Ford, to Morpeth, Ashington, and Cramlington in the far south of the county. Teaching in so many different environments gives you a wider view of school life, and an insight in to the lives of the children in the various schools.
This morning, up in the wilds near the Cheviots, I was encouraging the children in the first steps of songwriting. Having chosen a simple tune, I encouraged them to write their own words. Some found it quite hard to get started, so I asked them to think about what they loved more than anything else. One girl chose horses, and another dogs, and one pair of boys, wrote a lovely piece about loving coming to school with their friends. One little boy, a farmer's son, had me in stitches though, with a little song that started like this:
"I love sheep.
Sheep love me."
I'm afraid I can't remember any more of the song - probably due to the fact that I was trying not to cry with laughter in front of the whole class!
|
posted 2 Nov 2011 14:17 by flora peden smith
On Monday night I met my new choir! Nervous excitement (and fear of getting lost in Blyth) got me to the Emmanuel College beautiful Bede Academy site half an hour early, only to find that the security guard had no knowledge of a choir meeting that night! So I sat, lemon like, in the brightly lit foyer, and was over the moon when some choir members arrived, and then Sharon Durant, who I am taking over from.
Sharon teaches at the Academy, and has led the community choir there more or less since the school began. Sharon was also instrumental as a "leading light" so to speak, in my own transition from classroom teacher to singing leader. She works at The Sage, Gateshead, and is involved in schools in the area. See the link below to her Gospel Choir website.
What a friendly bunch - and considering they hadn't sang together since the summer, what a great choir! I can't wait to go back next week and have them all to myself!
|
posted 14 Oct 2011 00:50 by flora peden smith
This week has been busy - whole class teaching at 5 different schools, singing lessons at another two, plus after school clubs and choir etc. As well as my many bags of books, files and instruments, I felt I was physically taking with me the learning from the weekend, and using it in my teaching.
First up, Monday afternoon, whole class teaching, and I get "the look" from the class teacher - the look that says, WOW! Same on Wednesday, and yesterday, teaching voice students all day, I tried out some new warm-ups and breathing techniques, along with some voice skills. The pupils really took on board what I was trying to get across, improving and working on their singing, and I felt that my own teaching had moved up a level.
At choir last night I wanted to get across that sense of mammalian bonding that causes animals to herd - with the choir working together as a unit, rather than a loose group of individuals. It took a bit of convinving, but being a good natured bunch, we had a go - and hey presto! They understood what I meant, and what it meant for them. I have warned them that they will yet be subject to further experimentation, but they didn't seem overly concerned.
What was truly lovely, is that my friend and co-singing teacher and workshop leader Sarah Gray, had written a song for the choir. In fact, both of us had written songs for the choir, and both called "Harbour Lights". Sarah taught her beautiful and haunting song (now just called "Lights") last night - it meant so much to the choir members to have a song written particularly for them, and with such a strong sense of location and identity.
I hope to be leading a new choir from half-term, which has previously been led by my friend Sharon Durant, songwriter and vocal leader, working from The Sage, Gateshead. |
posted 10 Oct 2011 01:54 by flora peden smith
[
updated 10 Oct 2011 01:57
]
For those who have never attended a singing workshop, the idea of meeting up with a bunch of strangers (and some of them stranger than others!) for a weekend singing together might seem like an odd idea of a good time. As a workshop leader myself, I am always heartwarmed by the experience of those who find a confidence and voice that they did not know they had.
So it was a bit of a busman's holiday this weekend, going to Maddy Prior's Stones Barn in the wilds of Cumbria, to sing with my own vocal hero, Stephen Taberner, at his 3 day workshop. Stephen is probably best known in this country as the musical director and genius behind the enormous Spooky Men's Chorale. For me, it was the opportunity to learn from a personal guru, and squeeze every last drop of wonderment from the weekend.
So it was that a mixed bag of about thirty or so folk gathered in the middle of nowhere on Friday afternoon. Although I knew a few of the participants, most I had never met before, including the wonderful Maddy Prior herself, and we got to know eachother a wee bit over lunch. The weekend continued with wonderful food between the workshop sessions, encouraging and developing the sense of the group as a whole.
I don't know if I have the superfluous vocabulary to describe the sheer intense brilliance of the weekend, which for me was part professional development, part networking, with a large sweet dollop of humour and ingenuity thrown in. From rhythm, to breathing, singing, and improvising, one focus of the weekend was to create a sense of mammalian bonding, a herd instinct that would develop into a single source of sound, with no one person dominating or weaker than the others.
Sunday afternoon came too soon, after a weekend that I will remember for the rest of my life. Arriving home, I knew that I had experienced a paradigm shift, and that what I had learnt would immediately change my own work practice, and help me develop my own teaching style and focus.
|
posted 19 Sep 2011 01:57 by flora peden smith
This week sees me heading off back to work after nearly 2 months off! Over the summer I led a VIctorian Parlour Singing event at a castle, and sang with my choir at a local old folks care home, but have done very little singing or teaching.
I did start back at the beginning of term, with some teaching and training days, but last week was off with a nasty cold that meant I got very little done at all...
This term I am teaching at a number of different schools across Northumberland - in the Berwick Partnership, as well as Morpeth, Ashington and Cramlington. Today I start a new "Wider Opportunities" voice project in Berwick, which I am really looking forward to.
I am also gearing up for voice workshops Sing Gospel! in Cramlington, and Soup&Sing in Ingram and Durham... better stop blogging and get on with it then! |
posted 17 Jul 2011 12:22 by flora peden smith
I was invited to lead two workshops at the Street Choir Festival 2011 in Whitby. What a fantastic experience - hospitality was great, the venues were all well located, and the singing was amazing! Well done to the team who organised it, with a special mention to Rebecca Gross-Deniff, who was incredible at bringing everything together and led brilliantly.
I got home, exhausted but exhilarated, and with some extra good news - the care home that Harbour Lights have been singing in wants to sponsor the choir! I love my job!! |
posted 13 Jul 2011 07:25 by flora peden smith
[
updated 13 Jul 2011 07:36
]
I was, a number of months ago, invited to go and sing with my choir at a local care home, and the choir were keen to come along, but on the day we discovered that we were double booked, and as the other choir were already set-up and ready to go, we re-arranged the date, and went back last weekend.
We sat down, in the lounge, amongst the residents, and sang to them where they sat - some traditional songs, some african songs, and some more modern arrangements. To our delight, the residents joined in, and we had such a wonderful evening. I can honestly say, I do not know who enjoyed it more, but the duty manager was keen to get us to go back in, and has booked the choir for a date in August, and has also asked me if I would come and sing with the old folks and lead a session with them.
I have recently been investigating the possibilities of singing with the elderly, and feel so inspired by my experience that I will be contacting care homes and also the Alzheimer's Society to include this in my plans for the future! |
posted 11 May 2011 01:18 by flora peden smith
On Saturday morning I did my usual of coming down to the kitchen, and switching on Radio 4. Saturday Live was on, and I didn't pay much attention, until I heard someone talking about singing and realised that Howard Goodall was the studio guest for the day.
I first met Howard Goodall at the Sage, Gateshead a number of years ago at Music Learning Live where he was the keynote speaker. His talk was inspirational and moving, and he spoke intelligently about the need for encouraging singing within schools. This was just after the initial launch of Sing Up, and formed a basis for my own ideals for my work with children.
He is still inspirational, and speaks with real passion about singing, and having re-listened to the programme on i-player can only say that I wish that I could speak so eloquently about why singing matters.
Here is the link to the Saturday Live programme:
Here is the link to a synopsis of his speech at Music Learning Live in 2008
|
|
