Leeds Silver Sparrows Play Music For Youth Regional Festival at Garforth

Next!

Well, the music is rewritten and photocopied. Rick and Jason carry the in-tune guitar pans from the pan-room; Jeanette has agreed to stand in on them for the tune when Ashley takes the kit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And Debs, no-one was late for the train to Garforth! Ah the good old days when Jamillah [teenage player] and Joe [member of staff] missed the train to London for the Albert Hall gig. Or when Yasmin missed the train to to London for the Festival of Britain [and missed that altogether!] [And I had been to Yasmin's parents the night before to explain and emphasise that they must get her up on time!].

Sparrows were Chloe, Millies S and C, Ash, Peter, Claudia, Ciara, G2, George, with Jeanette guesting on the Flood. Tunes were I Could Have Danced All Night, our very own Millie S's Spirit of Trinidad, The Flood, Under the Sea [arr by our very own Peter].

Staff and parents were me [mostly sitting down], Bex, Gig, Bart, Vicky, Trish, Wendy, Bernard, Sarah, Jill. [And obviously this would not have been possible without Bex, Bart and Gig [and sometimes Mikey and Maya!] stepping up while I languished at home with the old cabin fever.]

They played their socks off, reduced a few of us to tears with the Flood and Under the Sea [with apologies to Somerset!], and then we watched a great selection of rock and classical stuff, with colleague, Alex Cairns's wonderful Garforth rock band, and then this incredible snare drum ensemble.

 

 

 

Four Go to Music For Youth Without the Band

Debs, you know that great Robbie Burns poem that he address to a homeless fieldmouse, in which he declares that the "best laid plans o' mice and men, gang aft agley  . . "

[Perhaps you don't Debs, as you are a Science teacher.]

Whatever. As we weren't playing the Music for Youth Festival [again!][and I had begun to consider it home] I thought it would be nice to take the New Sparrows down to see the other top UK bands in action, to compare ourselves, to check out the opposition, to declare that we had been robbed or to admit we needed to up our game. And to meet up with old pals from the pan world. Like Dave from North Tyneside [above].

Also, Xanthe had booked herself a place there with her wonderful SILC band, and we wanted to support her.


Xanthe, if you recall, arranged quite a few of the Foxwood/Sparrows top tunes [eg Tainted Love, Trini to the Bone] for us. And it was she who supported Sparrows through applying for Music For Youth in the first place.

To get the tickets cheaply I bought the first six some weeks ago, including two children's with a family railcard. Well, no-one under 16 was either interested or allowed to go!

By last week my sleep patterns, never good, were in disarray. Eventually Aretha and I discussed our little problem with the rail company, handed over £10 for each ticket to be changed, and then it was me, Diane, Tim and Amy alone on the 10.11 to Birmingham, city of music halls, central squares and culture.

Debs, it was an extra £40 well spent.

John Jamieson's SILC steelband, led by Xanthe Lewty, music arranged by herself, was mind-blowing. The arrangement as Beethoven Seven melted into Alex Clare Too Close was one thing, then there were the players themselves changing instruments between vocals, pans, kit, piano and electric guitar in a very unhurried and purposeful way. For me, and I think also for Diane, Tim and Amy, it was the outstanding performance of the day. There was a beautiful intensity to this performance, in my opinion, that no other band achieved.

Diane bought a meat sandwich!

We all cried and then hugged Xanthe, and then hugged some of the players too [after asking permission first of course].

Then we watched all the other bands, and they were great. Such virtuosity! Exciting, impressive. Many more steelbands than usual. Were we robbed? Should we up our game?

Well, neither. The way they played - the London and Newcastle bands - was massive, impressive, and immensely enjoyable, but it's not how we want to go with the Sparrows [or Foxwood or East Steel] in Leeds. Our tunes tell stories, tug at heart-strings; the dynamics are there, but are almost imperceptible. Our crescendos are long drawn-out affairs. We don't dance, we certainly don't smile. Our players only move if they are moved to move. And I think there is space for us all.

Sparrows play Music For Youth Harrogate

rehearsal bun break at City of Leeds School

You know Debs, what makes a thing work isn't only what happens on the day. It's what leads up to it. As well. So when the Sparrows played so beautifully today at St Aidan's it was because everything that had happened before came together.

rehearsal February

rehearsal January

First we chose an eclectic mix of tunes from different eras, then I sat at my desk, half an ear on the Lewis repeat of a repeat, mechanically copying out conventional music bars into Foxwood Songsheets.  Then we tried them out on the class. They sounded terrible. We persevered. By Week 4 they still sounded terrible and we hadn't even finished I Dreamed a Dream. By autumn half term I heard that they were making Les Miz into a film. Just what I needed. My idea of an unusual choice was being whistled down streets the length and breadth of mainland Music For Youth Britain.

Then it was the eighth or ninth week of learning our quartet of tunes when Sarah [I think it was Sarah] said: do we have to do these again? Well, yes, we did, over and over again. One by one, each of these new tunes had a breakthrough; then the Town Hall concert, then Pat and Lynn came to the last rehearsal for a bit of constructive criticism.




Then we had to carry the pans down the school corridors, and back into the van; on Friday Tim and took the instruments to Harrogate, and set the stands up in St Aidan's Hall; Saturday it's the train: getting on at Leeds, Burley Park, Horsforth, get off Hornbeam Park.

performing at St Aidan's

Walk a lot, buy tea and buns, play our tunes, listen to the other bands. Loved the Flutes; loved Tewitt, loved Mark Pallant's last orchestra, well loved all the ones we saw.

leading off

Long but nice adjudications. Suddenly it's 5.20 and we have to run for the train. Just made for the 5.40pm. Natalie and Vicky packed with remaining car-driven Sparrows. Rick drives to Leeds Civic Hall ready for the Lord Mayor's Banquet.

Sparrows and Doves at Music For Youth at Harrogate St Aidans School

Well Debs, I still have that cold that started when you were there at Tropical World Day One. I don't do off-work, but I did let Rick take the pans to St Aidan's on his own, while I reacquainted myself with sofa in the front room, and as usual, slept through the Archers.

We are playing this festival, the Music For Youth Regional just as Sparrows are moving their main practices from City of Leeds School to West Park; I have afore-mentioned multi-dimensional cold, and the flippin' Old Guard are getting older and now, even Amy is too old to be M4Y Sparrow. And Varshika is working 7am till 3pm in Leeds [and that means she is probably waking up at least two hours after she has started work. Can M and S tell that she is still asleep?]
This is our seventh year; got the mellow songs sorted way back in September; always knew they would be Your Song and Days, both classics; you, Debs, are usually our source of soca tunes but you're moving between Almondbury and Huddersfield while looking wistfully over the Atlantic; and none of previous tunes are inspiring me. In the end, Ashley says he knows Trinidad so init goes; then I added Moves Like Jagger. A two-chord wonder; the kids hated it, but they played it so well they fooled us all.

Stations: Carrie-ann met the first lot at Leeds City; the rest of us got on at Burley Park. Sparrows were the really old guard : Joe, Danielle, the nearly equally regular: Millie S, newish-comers: Ashley, Jenner, Evie, Nina, Maisie, Claudia, Millie C, Chloe, new-comers: Peter, Yash, Antonio, Nyla, Han. [Varshika was still at the shop tills in Leeds - we survived]. Staff were me, Bex, Joe [who thought that I had tricked him into getting to the station on time, by not revealing the actual train time!], Carrie-ann, Bart; parents were Trish, Wendy and Steve, Adele and Evie's mum; sisters were Jeanette; guests were Diane and her pal, Ruth.

Getting off at Hornbeam Park, walking down to Oatlands Whatever, tellin some kids off for not looking carefully as they cross over side roads, turn round to find Bart doing a wheelie in his wheelchair off the kerb on the side street. OMG! Just can't get the staff these days!

I asked Mark from St Aidan's to give Sparrows first, and Doves last slots. The penultimate band finished; there was a silence; we knew that even as the applause died away Vicky was collecting Varshika from Hornbeam Park. Then the doors open; Varshika runs through the hall and straight out the back doors to put her Doves top on. There's only three Doves proper this year: Joe, Varshika and Danielle; Ashley, Nina and Maisie guest for them; they do Morning, In the Hall of the Mountain King, and Sweet Soca. The judges think that Grieg "would have been thrilled". These are songs decades into the Foxwood repertoire, given a new airing. And Doves, new and old were ace. And did us justice.

Wild Horses, Otley Chevin and Music For Youth in Bradford

Dear Debs, So, you're in Abu Dabi, where I guess it's hot and we're here in Yorkshire, where it definitely is the coldest night this winter.

Setting the scene. On behalf of my local high school, City of Leeds, I teach at several local primaries. You won't be surprised to learn that I teach music to them all, whole classes of percussion: steelpans, glocks, xylophones, djembes, tambourines and anything else you can shake, rattle or hit.

Not a primary school teacher by training or inclination, I first entered the Schools for Smalls with some trepidation back in 1996 when I joined the Leeds Music Service as a peri. And once I got the hang of it, and got over the fact they kept bursting into tears, well, I guess I did quite like them - well Years 5 and 6 anyway. So when Tracey emailed me just after Christmas and asked if I was coming in on the first week back, I replied: Wild Horses . . . . and so the 3-5 school Hyde Park Percussion Orchestra was renamed. And, Debs, on the right here is Shire Oak, Blenheim and Quarry Mount at their first joint rehearsal in the City of Leeds Drama studio. Along with Rosebank and Springbank we're all entering theMusic For Youth Regional Festival at St Aidan's Harrogate on March 10th. If they all come it'll be nearly 100 children all in one band. But I am not counting my little chickens until they all get to Burley Park Station.

I was hyper all Thursday evening with how well they'd played. I needed a walk on the Chevin. That's Sunday me, Diz, Lola, Joe, Ben. Me and Ben only had thin socks in our wellies, and after jumping in a few ice pools, Ben retired frozen feet; as a responsible adult I kept out of the puddles after that, and the photo is the little leader again with her mum.

Back to the working week, and now it's the Leeds Silver Doves at the Music For Youth primary Prom in Bradford St George's Hall. We had to meet at 7.30 am at Leeds Station. Me, Joe M and some teenagers, and a couple of 20 pluses. None of us with a track record of early rising!

Varshika was at the station for the 8 o'clock train to Liverpool for her Uni interview. She texted Amy that she assumed we'd all made it as there was none of us left on the platform. Well actually one of us was still in bed! No problem, Joe M1 stood in for the soundcheck and Joe M2 got the bus over plenty of time for first set. Teachers were me and Joe; players were Amy, Joe, Sophie, Nina, Ashley, Maisie, Danielle, Georgia. Played Your Song, Swan Lake and Is Heat. Ashley did pan de neck into the audience. The audience clapped along with gusto from the start. [You may not be surprised to know that I advised them not to.]

The compere was Barney from Children's TV; Danielle and Ashley were in heaven, and Ashley even kidnapped said compere so they could have pics taken with him.

I laughed but actually 30 years ago, I saw the Undertones at this very same venue and waited outside afterwards to get Feargal Sharkey's autograph - which I still have. Also saw the Cure here, but was seated to watch them, so did not really get into it. The photos above are from the soundcheck.