A splendid session with the Shetland Youth Orchestra at Mareel Lerwick - their new home (complete with a storage room for their instruments). It was their first Saturday back after the Summer holidays, with most of the orchestra sightreading the chosen piece New Orleans Funk at the start of the session.
Stuart conducted, whilst Chihiro, Jess and Jo sat in the orchestra. It was amazing to watch these talented young musicians absorb every note and elevate their playing which each iteration. Stu talked to them about posture, breathing and the importance of having an eye on the leader as well as listening to other sections, not just your own. With just a few exercises in breathing and the conductor’s upbeat (explaining the winds/brass have to breathe before making their note, so strings have to breathe too to be beautifully in sync) the whole orchestra were breathing as one. On to the journey arc through each phrase, of finding a destination within the long held notes, the shifts in excitement levels, and other musical observations. With each note came a little exercise to embed the idea, and up the level of playing would go again.
By the end of the session the orchestra played the piece with such verve, character and accuracy that Stu became quite emotional - he had not expected them to fly to such heights in just 2 and a half hours. When it came to those who wanted to perform the piece alongside us at the concert that night, 14 felt confident enough and wanted to be on stage in front of an audience, which was many more than expected and a testament to how much they’d got out of the session.
I headed back to Bigton to lead a Repair workshop (woolly jumpers), whilst Stu, Jo, Chihiro and Jess found some lunch in Lerwick and visited the Peerie Shop.
The mending was underway in the Proil at Hymhus when they returned to rehearse in the main space there, so we mended holes in jumpers to the music of their rehearsal - lovely.
Audrey gave us our tea, then concert time at Hymhus. Stu introduces the project, and each piece of music - a journey through blues and the gilded jazz age, with some classics thrown in - then comes the moment for the young musicians to join us on stage. Wanting everyone to get involved Stu gives the audience percussive sounds to make in 3 parts, which will kick off in the middle of New Orleans Funk. We’ve not rehearsed that with the young musicians, so a very rapid run through of how that section works… and we’re off. It was a great performance of the piece and a huge amount of fun for the audience to make their percussion sounds as part of it. Everyone was so excited by the end Stu decided to play Moon RIver as an encore to calm the room down!
After which came the social part of the evening with teas, coffees, cakes and much chat amongst all the generations.
Thank you to the Bigton Community for welcoming us again, for inviting us to work with the young musicians of Bigton and the Shetland Youth Orchestra (both joyous), to Alice and Jonathan Ritch for the organising and production management at Hymhus, to Annalie for being all over the SYO details, and to our generous hosts Audrey, Winnie and Joe.
