playing about

Back to Marston Montgomery last Friday. Here's the village well - a great little stage for one little diva member of the Under 5's group who likes to perform here singing "TwinkleTwinkle Little Star." We made sure we worked it into the new song written by the mums and minders and then tried it out with the children at the end of their play session. It worked really well and was full of quack quacks, splish sploshes, and zoom zooms - all connnected with Marston and the surrounding area - anywhere little children like to go. Then off to Doveridge to work with 4 men with learning disabilities who live on Derby Road.....

Great fun in the afternoon - and just as wonderfully playful. After learning each other's names in song and rhyming them, we wrote a song celebrating their home , the things they like to do and where they like to go - including the friendly Vernon Arms pub at Sudbury for a pint or a coke. Other staff gathered at the door and were drawn in. Everybody was surprised at how the men stuck with it for over an hour and were enthusiastic and engaged. Can't wait to go back...

cows, tractors, ducks and a church

All roads led to Marston Montgomery last week - and the start of working with groups there. On Thursday evening I worked in the village hall kitchen with members of the Youth Club. Like most youth clubs it was pretty anarchic and, as I expected, only a handful of young people had the staying power to stick with it. But what a great lot this handful were! I am learning that the John Deere tractor is a big part of life round here (kids at Sudbury also talked about it) and I'm sure it deserves a love song ("Oh John deere...."). Anyway, this lot talked a lot about cows, sheep and muck... We started a song dwelling on the madder and even fantasy elements of living in Marston stimulated by the observation that the Friesans go a bit mad in the Spring and were compared to the more unruly elements at the Youth Club!
We are meeting again next week, so watch this space.....

After a night at a B and B to save the long drive home to Sheffield, I spent the next morning at the village hall again - this time with mums and children from Marston Under 5's group. I busied myself chatting to mums about the area and where their children enjoy to go as the starting point for a little action song which will be a sort of "Babies Guide". Here is one of the children looking for ducks in a neighbour's garden after the session - I am sure we can work them in! At the end of their morning, I led a short music and song session.

After lunch in the pub, off to Doveridge to work with adults with learning disabilities at a residential home there. Unfortunately, they were unexpectedly short staffed that day - a real difficulty for many homes when illness strikes and I could see that my presence wasn't going to help matters. So we agreed to meet the following week and added in another week before Easter. Really looking forward to it even though I know I won't have much time to get the measure of the residents.

With some time now unexpectedly on my hands, I decided to have a look at Norbury church. Cllr Carol Valentine - another church architecture buff - and I had talked about churches as potential performance venues and I had heard that Norbury had a particularly fine church. I wasn't disappointed. The windows and glass and consequently the light in the chancel are breathtaking and more than a bit spooky. And look at these wonderful lords and ladies on the tombs. Don't they deserve a song? George Eliot's father sang in the choir here. I tried out the accoustics by singing, rather self conciously, and hoped no-one was listening to this mad woman.

young and old in sudbury

Yesterday the children at Sudbury School
and I finished our crinkle crankle wall song and were invited by local historian Audrey to meet her in her garden the other side of the wall. There were lots of questions about old Sudbury and Audrey's own childhood there. She was the daughter of the gardener to Lord Vernon at Sudbury Hall and also went to Sudbury School. Then we sang her our new song in the garden:

Chorus:
Crinkle crankle
crankle crinkle
crinkle crankle wall
curly wurly, snaky, wavy
standing up so tall.

1. Bricks are prickly, rough and crumbly
taking in the sun,
chipped and bumpy, old and lumpy,
Can be as hot as a hot cross bun

2. Blackbirds tweeting, whistling, fluttering
in the trees up high.
feet in the stalks are crickling, crackling,
crow and buzzard fly in the sky.

Later I went to Audrey's house and spent a good hour and a half poring over the books of photos, memorabilia and writing she has put together about the village, the Hall, the Vernons and her life. Her house is one of the estate cottages in the main street and is very eccentric in that her cellar goes under someone elses, the attic comes across from yet someone else's and altogether is a right hotch potch structurally - but beautiful, homely and very ancient. I loved it. We had a rare old time and she will be a great resource, together with her may contacts with other older villagers and her outstanding historical knowlege and archiving skills for the future of work here. She loved meeting the children - and they her.

crinkle crankling in sudbury, smoked salmon and pop in longford

The first chance I have to post this since a long day in Sudbury on Tuesday.

There are no other primary schools who can boast a crinkle crankle wall wall. The children in Sudbury
thought it was unsung and we spent a good morning visiting the wall - investigating it with all our senses and by the end had written a chorus for a new song. Watch this space!

The afternoon was very pleasantly spent with a group of older adults at the Parish rooms gathering material and memories for a song about Sudbury. I learned that the River Dove is pronounced to rhyme with stove - not love, that Uttoxeter is pronounced Utcheter and that Fred, the ex postman was the boy for a bit of hanky panky on the haycart. And that he can claim that his family has lived in the village for 500 years - longer than the famous Vernons of Sudbury Hall. I also met the marvellous Audrey there - local historian, fount of all knowledge - and who has the other side of the crinkle crankle wall (the really curvy side) in her garden. It's a secret, but she has invited me and the kids from the school to visit her there on Monday. Perhaps we'll sing to her.

Evening and off to local councillor Carol Valentine's house in Longford again.She had arranged for me to meet her together with county councillor Andrew Lewer and Longford based Ashbourne Festival volunteer Cordelia Wesby. All were very pleased that we were working in this rather forgotten part of Derbyshire. Andrew told me all about the Shrovetide football in Ashbourne and I got home and looked it up in Commonground's marvellous book England in Particular. I love these extraordinary, ancient things and traditions you find in the midst of so called ordinary people and places. We all promised to keep in touch and they were keen to be involved in the project in the long term, should we get further funding. The smoked salmon was ace. Who says there are no perks to this job?

Later evening - off to meet Ginty Leedham and the Youth Club she has been running for 17 years now in Longford. The youth clubs down this neck of the woods are all run by volunteers. A group of girls were particularly interested, SATs permitting, to get involved in some song writing in April and May. We might tempt the boys yet. Marston Montgomery Youth Club are also signed up for some songwriting. The members of both clubs seem to be fuelled during the evening by pop, sweets and crisps. Bet they're glad Jamie Oliver has not cottoned onto this yet.

Home at 10.30pm after a 7.30am start. Phew!