Mon 5th March     (Session 3)

am   9.15 - 12.00     SALTWOOD PS 

Ran through their composition from start to finish, and then carried on from where we had left off. After break I played the students my recording of the St Leonard's piece which I had made at the last session, and we talked about what they thought of it.  We then listened to the recording of their own music and we discussed how successful it was, and what bits, if any, should be altered.

One of the points we all agreed on was that the ideas in the music were being delivered too fast.  The music was so interesting and paced that it was hard for 'horrorful' images to fill the mind.  As a result we experimented stretching out some of the key ideas as well as making more use of space within the composition.  We discovered this added greatly to the suspense of the piece.  By the end of the morning the piece was more or less completed, apart from the ending, which we would do tomorrow.

pm   1.00 - 3.15    ST LEONARD'S PS

Some students were out for this session as they were taking a cycling proficiency test.  Those that remained (about three quarters) first of all ran through their composition, which they found difficult to do as certain key people were absent.  There was quite a lot of swapping around of instruments to compensate, but eventually they realised that it was better just to stick with their original instruments and simply bear in mind that the others were absent.  We ran through the piece a few times adding to it as we went along and consolidated some of the ideas.

I played them the recording of their piece, and we discussed what was good about it and what didn't work. They found it amusing that they still jumped at the 'scary' loud bits, even though they knew they were coming up!

During this session the composition didn't grow much in length as the students kept discovering ways of improving what they had already done. A couple more students were also given the responsibility to cue various sections, and we worked a little on creating multi-level textures, with the group simultaneously taking cues from three or more controllers.

We finished the session by listening to the recording of the Saltwood composition, and before everyone went away I gave Abbie the CD recording of the music to take away and learn, in order to help her memorise all her cues.

For this session, Chris Bill, the class teacher, was present for all of the afternoon, and he was really hooked at the end of it.  He told the class he was amazed at their progress, and spoke to me personally about certain individuals who had shone, in the respect that they had taken dominant roles within the composition unlike than in their normal school work.  This had enabled him to see a new side to some of his students.