This is where the helpful people who volunteered to blog singing/ dance and exercises at this session will put their words:

Singing with JOx

So here is the non technical blog of our singing. I hope that JOx or someone who had a pen to hand or a superior memory will fill in the details of what the songs were called and how the phrasing and intervals work.

We began the sessions by intoning a nasal NG sound whilst mouthing the numbers 1-6. Standing in a circle, we then swapped places with someone else in the group using the steady beat of the counting to cross the space – arriving and swapping on the 6th count. We noticed the importance of really stepping on the beat and maintaining the rhythm and regularity of the counting.

JOx then separated the group into men and women and then into sub sections of high, mid-range and low voices. He taught us a phrase which had a constant note that stepped up an interval for 2 bars and then down for 2 bars. Please correct here if ‘interval’ is the wrong term! The phrase was simple but remarkably effective when male and female voices combined, singing in different octaves. The sliding and tone of the phrase was likened by JOx to certain chord sequences in Spanish guitar and the quality of the sound was dependent on communal singing.

We then revisited Sian’s work, standing in 2 lines and weaving up and down the line whilst singing, taking hands alternately on the first beat of each bar. One group would hold an intoned note whilst the other held the phrase. We developed this by moving altogether in a circle and adding in a male and female voice to improvise freely over and around the phrase.

This work reminded me of early dance which is so dependent on groups moving and creating shapes and patterns as a unit. Whilst the phrases and movements are seemingly easy – really keeping the beat and the spacing of the dances – or the rhythm and clarity of the notes is actually very hard. Harder still is the challenge of finding an ease within the song or dance so that instead of concentrating on technicalities - we as a group could find a way of communicating, telling a story or playing an action through song and dance. There’s something undeniably powerful - and enjoyable -about moving and singing communally. It also, quite usefully, takes an actor’s focus off the self and out onto other individuals and the space.
(that was by Jo Croll)

(Colin Hurley):


Then Tamara Harvey-Nichols gave us the task of telling a book, incorporating the singing and dancing we had been forced to learn by our Zingenmeister of Schadenfreude, J Von Oxenlegen, and Sian, our Spirit Guide and Head Druid. Two groups. fifteen minutes. Show and tell. Feedback. We had a narrated version and a wordless version. Interesting. Fun. Then Fedora T'Adora set us the challenge of telling a personal story of a time someone turned out to be Not What You Thought (read the book)...and here's the clever bit... adapting the steps and singing we had just used. None of that fifteen minutes beaullocks this time. We were up before we knew it. The results were.. well, more personal. Moving. Everyone seemed to move up a level in terms of being aware and picking up offers. What I Did Learn Today, and I know it's fluckin' obvious, but What I Did Learn Today, is what fun there is to be had when we take the singing and the dancing and invest it with something of us. There was a kicking step, which suddenly seemed to be the perfect step to express how we felt about A Certain Person. On the tune, the little set of notes we'd become friends with, we could hang any words we wanted! We could make them up, or sing something back at a speaker. In the second exercise it seemed we worried less about Trying To Get It Right, and were more focused on playing. Dunno about anyone else, but that's why I'm here. To play. Have fun. There. I've said it. The 'F' word.

The Other Thing I Learned Today: Can't keep doing these evenings without reading the books.