Spreading a Little Happiness

Some brief reflections on yesterday's Pop Up Proms concert at Brooklands Care Home in Drayton.

Just one picture for now.
But a picture tells a thousand words, and we've got some fantastic photos of last night's audience having a whale of a time at our very first Pop Up Proms concert. When I have the relevant permissions I'll set up a photo gallery.

But until then, I will attempt to illustrate the concert myself. 

It went very well indeed. About thirty residents attended, which was, apparently, an excellent turnout. Some residents' family members also came, and of course, the staff and carers popped in and out as well. Brooklands staff helped decorate the room with red, white and blue bunting and flags- it looked a proper Proms treat.

We were in the residents' lounge, a largish, low-ceilinged room, with comfy chairs and sofas arranged in a circle around the edge - and a huge pillar in the centre. We worked around it!

As we waited to begin our show, Christina set to work capturing those all important reminiscences from some of our elderly audience.

After a short introduction from me, Martyn kicked off the show with 'Oh What a Beautiful Morning'. Any fears we may have had about people not joining in with the singing were instantly allayed. EVERYONE joined in! It was brilliant.

They continued to join in (in some cases even when we didn't ask!) throughout the whole show. All the performers did wonderfully. Highlights for us all were the lady who danced to every song and the lady who loved the Matt Munroe medley. And how could we ever forget Joanie's rendition of Big Spender - sung from the laps of various surprised and delighted elderly gentlemen?!

The timings went according to plan and the last 15 minutes, set aside for our special 'Proms Finale', arrived in a flash. Armed with lyrics sheets to sing from and Union Jack flags to wave, our audience enthusiastically participated throughout 'Land of Hope and Glory' and 'Jerusalem', and our final number, 'Rule Britannia'!

Christina managed to capture some more recordings as we tidied our things away. The staff were thrilled with the hour's entertainment and commented on what an extremely positive experience the visit from the Pop Up Proms Project had been for all concerned.

All in all, a good evening's work. And home by 8.30!

Your Pop-Up Proms Needs YOU (whether you sing or not)

My last blog posting contained a bit of detail for the volunteers wanting to sing and perform. This post is for the volunteers doing the other -equally important- stuff.

As you know, The Pop-Up Proms Project is a smiley happy voluntary thingy which I hope will bring as many positive benefits to the volunteers as it will to our audiences. The project has two main thrusts.

'"THRUST" that's a good word, isn't it? "THRUST"'(-one for the 'Miranda' fans...)

The two THRUSTS are:
1) The giving of free entertainment to elderly people in homes and day centres, and all the attached benefits to those people, such as social interaction, a bit of fun, gentle exercise, and sharing reminiscences.
2) The Audio Archive- collecting and recording the memories evoked by the music.

For those wishing to volunteer but not currently (or ever!) performing, there are various things which need to be done in order to achieve both THRUSTS of the project.

Here's a list. Please do let me know which of these you might feel comfortable doing...

• coming along and not doing a solo performance, but mingling as part of the audience and joining in to help get everyone else going in the joiny-inny bits.
• coming along to chat informally to audience members about the music, and encouraging them to think about memories and associations they may have to these, or any other, songs (ie "Is this a song you've heard before? Is it a favourite of yours? What was the first record you bought? etc).
• occasionally using a small digital audio recording device to record some of the recollections for the archive as you chat- with the permission of the participants, of course... 
• gently hassling people beforehand to donate red, white and blue stuff like bunting, flags or balloons for us to decorate the rooms with for performances.
• helping decorating the rooms before performances- nothing fancy; about ten minutes of putting up a bit of bunting and arranging some chairs.
• photocopying lyrics sheets for the audience.
• pressing 'play' on the CD player.
• mentioning The Pop-Up Proms Project to people when appropriate, to help get us a few more bookings.
• anything else helpful you can think of! 

If these things sound feasible, please let me know. And if at any point you decide you'd like to have a go at performing after all - brilliant!

As always, email me or send an FB message if you have any questions. Or, let's be radical, you could even phone me direct!

'THRUST. Ooh, its gone weird now...'

Pop Up Proms Project Audio Archive

I threatened to talk more about the reminiscencing aspect of the Pop-Up Proms Project last time. So to make good my threat, here's what's happening (hopefully).

Each time we perform we'll be building in time to talk to the people in the audience; after all, participation is what it's all about. I'll be asking the folks in the audience to tell us about any memories, feelings or associations the music may have stirred up, and I'll be making an audio recording of what they say (with their permission, of course).

What is the point of making these recordings?

• This project is designed to help increase social interaction for our elderly audience members within their existing group.  Locally and individually, keeping evidence of a community project like this acts as a reminder for the participants and helps add to their sense of 'belonging' and shared identity.
• Regionally, capturing reminiscences like this in audio 'snapshot' format is a way to gather original source material for local and social history museums and archives to hold and keep safe for generations to come. 
• Having the opportunity to hear real voices singing and talking about real songs will help history seem more 'real' for pupils, students and teachers in the future. 

What will happen to these recordings?

At the moment there are two possibilities:

• They'll be added to the Sound Archive at the Norfolk Records Office and held for posterity and educational purposes.
• I'll continue to build links between this project and Norfolk Museums & Archaeology Service- specifically, bringing an audio element to some planned work on the 1950s displays at Gressenhall Farm & Workhouse.