Busking
I was busking with the harp in a busy pedestrian shopping street in Gloucester today. This street is not the most upmarket, and there’s a huge social mix there, including many who are obviously struggling. But quite near the start, a woman in her sixties was standing next to me and slightly behind, so I […]
Review of 2013 – creative chaos and joy!
It’s great to look back on a very busy year with a large number of projects covering several fields – performance, teaching, designing and media production. It felt pretty chaotic at times, but looking at it from more of a distance, there is a common thread of collaborative creativity. Some were harder work than others, […]
Effective Practice – a snapshot of the ESMBH project 2 Oct 2013
This is a project to encourage mothers to bond with their babies through shared music in the Neonatal Unit at Gloucester Hospital, UK What has made this effective? Suggested new areas for clinical / musical research coming out of our experience in the NNU: ESMBH site (for parents) And a question: How can a musical […]
Music and the Heart (as opposed to the brain)
This article says everything about our own thinking although it’s based on heart research. I’d add two things: not for nothing did we call our programme “Early Start – Music by Heart” and when it comes to producing clinical proof of the effectiveness of music on babies, I’m not sure that’s going to be that […]
Progress report – Gloucester Hospital Neonatal Music
Thought I’d write an update on how the music is doing in the Neonatal unit at Gloucester Hospital in the UK, in case any of it might be applicable / useful to anyone else doing this anywhere else. We started this project with an idea to play harp music to babies, and once we got […]
Making the most of our different senses when learning
How we use a particular sense without questioning whether it’s the most appropriate. With my youngest student last week, she was having real difficulty sight-reading (on the piano at this point, but applies to both piano and harp), and I came to the conclusion it was mainly lack of confidence. I know this because when […]
Music videos for local duo
Editing music and creating music video is easier when you understand music! Creating any music video is a mix of project management, technical and musical skills. These are two videos I planned, shot and edited for Generation Jones, a very talented duo in Gloucestershire, UK. Following much valuable discussion with the band, I shot the […]
Video for LSO Education website
Video for education & PR This was part of a set of six videos created for the LSO from a mix of archive SD material gathered by the LSO and HD material and interviews shot by Alison Harmer, who is an experienced Early Years music professional and leads many cutting-edge projects herself. That, and her […]
Self-promotion – turn-off or essential?
After struggling with the shameless ways some people promote their work online, I have come to accept that there is a legitimate place for promoting myself. I speak as someone with a very British reluctance to do anything in public that I didn’t deem perfect, and over the years (my Carolan’s Dream video in 2006 […]