Happy New Year everybody! It’s been a good start to the year. Sales of the Cellobabies books are going very well and there are plans to start Cellobabies lessons in Taunton, Somerset. My colleague, Audrey Gullick is in the process of recruiting young players. Do get in touch with me if you live near Taunton and would like to be put in touch with her.
I started some more Cellobabies students this week; at Arundale School, 50% of the Reception class are now learning the cello! I wonder if this is a record! Trials on Violinbabies are similarly going extremely well; feedback has been very positive and encouraging. At the time of writing I anticipate releasing ‘Violinbabies’ in the Spring, with a website to accompany, courtesy of Geoff, my webmaster extrordinaire!
It has been an exciting couple of weeks. Firstly, I had 2 festivals (Worthing and Taunton in Somerset) where I heard some very fine and committed string playing from lots of young players.
Last Sunday was the ESTA (European String Teacher’s Association) National Forum day at the Yehudi Menuhin School in Surrey. Cellobabies was featured in a seminar given by Maureen Smith (Violin teacher at the Royal College of Music) on Beginner’s methods and I was also given the tell the delegates about how it all works. I was very pleased to have the opportunity to talk about my work to colleagues in the profession and it certainly has generated a lot of interest. If you have never come across ESTA before it is worth taking a look at the website www.estaweb.org.uk It is a fantastic organisation providing much support and information for the string teaching profession and I have been involved with it since my student days.
One development since then is Ackerman Music is now stocking my cellobabies books in all of their stores across Sussex.
I delivered the completed Violinbabies drafts to Judith & Sara who are trying it out for me. Sara reported very encouraging progress with one student who had difficulty with note-reading and who showed enormous improvement after being withdrawn from conventional reading for a short time to use my method, and then returned to her music and was able to read with greater security.
I now have the Violinbabies material being given a trial out there in the big wide world with real students. I’m particularly keen to find a few 3 to 5 year olds in the Horsham and Crawley area who would like to be amongst the first ‘Violinbabies’. Do get in touch with me if you want to know more. My colleague, Sara Stagg, who is the violin teacher putting the method through its paces has a limited number of spaces and we are keen to try it with the under 5’s, having already got some 6 year old customers.
Exciting time really……………..
In my last blog, I referred in passing to the recent upturn in interest in Cellobabies over the past few months. I have received queries from several parts of the UK as well as the USA and New Zealand. Cellobabies is now being taught in some Surrey & London Schools and one particularly exciting project is being formed in Exeter, Devon. Kirsty Hugil, the Director Of Exeter Young Strings ,is hoping to establish two music centres as part of an inclusion programme for children from disadvantaged areas of the city and is intending to use ‘Cellobabies’ and it violin version, ‘Violinbabies’ as the main teaching material.
This is tremendously exciting but the outcome is dependant on finding the funding. Kirsty is approaching some well known organisations but if anybody is keen to offer some sponsorship for this very worthwhile project, please email her at exeteryoungstrings@yahoo.co.uk
Well, a happy new academic year in the UK. After a much needed break taken with the family in Wales, I’m back at the coal face of teaching and feel like life is hitting me at 200 mph already!
The new edition of the Cellobabies book is ready to roll off the press and should be available in the next couple of weeks and I’m knuckling down to complete the violin version as soon as possible. I’ve been really encouraged by the marked upturn of interest in the method since the beginning of summer.
I notched up another birthday in August (21 again!). My husband made me a lovely cello bow which is just great to handle, It made its debut in 3 concerts at the Greenbelt festival (Cheltenham) at the end of the month. My better half is working on a cello for me, which is at the stage of having the purfling put into the belly and back sections. I certainly am a lucky old bird.
I received an email a few days ago from the Music of Life foundation. Music of Life is a non-profit making organisation which provides wonderful performance and training opportunities for musicians with physical disabilities or Special Educational Needs and enjoys the support of people like Evelyn Glennie.
I have taken on pupils with ‘Special Needs’ (Can’t say I like the term particularly!) throughout my teaching career and they have been without doubt amongst my most rewarding students, challenging me to be more imaginative in my teaching. One of my most memorable students was an ex-naval commander who was blind and aged 73 at the the time he started his lessons. John continued playing his cello until shorthly before his death, 8 years later. His wife told me that learning the cello had given him a new lease of life and had enriched his last years. That’s what teaching is about for me – enriching lives and that is reward enough.
Have a look at Music for Life’s website – mofl.co.uk
Festival season is well under way. February, March & November are traditionally the busy times and so it is for me, wearing my adjudicator’s hat!
Judging at music festivals is a humbling experience. I remember my own experience as a competitor and often think how much more confident the youngsters are at that age, than I was!
There is no doubt that learning a musical instrument not only boosts brain ability and social skills but also confidence. A festival is a fantastic place to learn how to ‘perform’, thus honing communication and presentation skills. It is also an opportunity to receive feedback from a professional musician and that is where I come in these days.
I don’t find it terribly hard thinking of constructive things to say to each student. After all, they want another opinion to help them improve on their performance and it is perfectly possible to offer constructive criticism without resorting to putting the performer down.
I am horrified to hear stories (most of them from parents) who were publicly ripped to shreds by the adjudicator – one friend had her piano playing described as ‘an elephant treading in treacle’ and that comment has stayed with her 40+ years later! Words can really hurt and for a very long time. So I find the tendency of some judges on TV to insult rather than offer constructive help somewhat disturbing and can’t help but wonder why people buy into this sort of negative approach.
Anyway, another 3 festivals to go before I put my feet up for Easter!
For the past few weeks, I’ve been working on transferring the Cellobabies method over to Violin.
It was very easy at the beginning but I needed to do a rethink about how to build up the reading skills, bearing in mind that the violin uses a different clef and has an ‘E’ string. Anyway, I whizzed my ideas past my daughter’s violin teacher yesterday and got a thumbs up, which was really encouraging. I think I’m past the most difficult part of the adaptation and the rest should be plain sailing (I hope!) from now on.
I’ve started 3 more Cellobabies off during the past 2 weeks. I was really tickled when one of them said at her second lesson, ‘Please can we sing ‘Kippers & Custard’?’ Judging by the popularity of this song with Cellobabies past & present, I reckon I would have a No.1 hit with this song, were there a Pre-schooler’s music chart.
Hello everybody! welcome to my Cellobabies Blog. Had an interesting experience today and thought it would make a good subject to start off on; I took part in a quizz this morning on BBC Southern Counties Radio. My good friend, Catherine Black had volunteered me as a contestant in the ‘Battle of Sussex’ feature on the Neil Pringle Breakfast show yesterday. It seems that they wanted to interview 2 cellists, one from West Sussex and the other from East Sussex (Catherine) about our work and then we each had to answer 6 questions.
Well, I can tell you that I did not sleep too well. My brain has been a little mushy recently and I was dreading answering any questions under pressure, especially about sport (I am a total ignoramus when it comes to sport). As it turned out, I didn’t disgrace myself, only managing to get the sports qustion wrong (surprise, surprise!) and I managed to pip Cath to the post by one point. Hope she will still talk to me! However it gave us a wonderful opportunity to speak about our special cello projects; Cellobabies in my case and Catherine spoke about her cello courses. She has just sent me through details of her next season of cello courses in Lewes and they look great! There is something there for everyone – why not take a look on her website, www.cellocourses.com