Yesterday was our first day on the film with a great group on the Inclusion Connect special needs Project in Washwood Heath, and for me it was my first full workshop as a newly self employed workshop faciliator. After a good deal of planning, i’m very pleased to say that it turned out real well and was a great and very positive experience for me as much as the participants.
Although it’s my first special needs workshop, it’s my 3rd workshop working with Pyn from Dramask (who’s also behind the interactive performance, and community workshop side of our Mr Elephant events). In our last two workshops i’ve been bringing my music technology side in to provide the soundtrack in partnership with the Pyn’s drama side, and its been a great combination so far.
This however, was a new exploration for both of us and despite a good deal of planning and creative meetings, we weren’t sure how the two would work in this environment. Suffice to say though all thoughts were put to rest as soon as the session started, with all participants seeming fully engaged til the end, and not only delivering the objectives we hoped, but also furthering social skills in ways we didnt expect.
We began with a couple pf icebreakers, first a drama game led by Pyn, and then a music game led by me. The music game also doubled up as a way to introduce the music equipment, and to get people comfortable with using it and speaking on the microphone.
I also recently bought a novation launchpad in order to make using ableton lite a lot easier for the group. I’m thinking of investing in another one as it would be nice to have multiple users so they can work together, as opposed to taking it in turns. I’d love to upgrade ableton too as its a great bit of software for production, performance, and there’s a host of ways i could further integrate the features in workshops, but its going to be a good while before i have enough money i think.
Next up we began to look at creating the 1st of 3 scenes which would provide the starting point to our film (which is going to be shot by another elephant resident Mr Jack Brabant) and which also gave us the opportunity to look at ways we can use sound and drama to bring the scenes to life.
The 2nd scene was where the plots started to get really interesting, with some strong performances and great improvisation.
What we found was not only did the group each bring their own thing to the scenes in ways we didnt imagine, but also that their personal responses to the scenarios we set, provided more storyline for the plot of the short film.
It was also great to see the dynamic of the group and how they knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses and backed each other up where they could.
On that note, big shouts must also go out to the support workers who both did a superb job of keeping the group moving forward. It seems a large part of workshops in community settings is not just delivering a great workshop, but also having great support staff. This is best pic we have largely because both support workers were also capturing most of the footage.
Whilst Pyn was expertly leading the drama side, i was leading the music side with participants taking it in turns to trigger and play various sounds. These ranged from using incidental music and sound efx through to playing actual instruments and rhythms to express the parts, all triggered via the launchpad, remote sl, and ableton lite. The learning curve throughout the 2 hour session seemed well within each participant’s ability and paved the way nicely for some music creation next time.
At the end of the session we finished with an evaluation. It’s a great technique, whereby you draw a bullseye with 2 surrounding circles and invite all participants to put an x on the board. The more they enjoyed the session the closer to the bulls eye they put their cross.
Thankfully everyone seemed to really enjoy the session, and participants also gave some useful feedback for our next session.
It’s going to be a couple of months before we recommence as there are a couple of meetings and religious holidays, then its xmas, so we will have to wait a while before our next session, but both of us are well excited and looking forward to where we can take it.
A great group of people and i for one am feeling pretty lucky to be working in such good company.
Its was a very wet sunday, but despite the torrential rain, the festival was great to be part of. Dramask had been asked to host a tent at the annual Water for Life Festival run by the environment agency, and i was asked to provide a suitable audio backdrop to the mask making activities (i thought i’d take our mr elephant banner with us what with it being the bbc).
I asked dj, mate and custom made promoter Mark Smallman to come spin some world beats with me, who was most excited that Jelly was around.
As the day went on, we even got to offer a few drop in workshops ourselves, which seemed to make this budding dj really chuffed….
and despite claiming to have no rhythm or musical skill blended two of his favourite records together with ease.
Jenny Commins also was part of the Dramask tent, and helped participants make and decorate card masks, which seemed to brighten up the afternoon.
And then of course there was the main music stage, and a few other tents. My favourite other tent was most definitely the lets tent, and it was inspiring to meet people who had created sustainable livelihoods through sharing skills. The main stage had a range of music and performances all aimed at a family audience. My favourite that i saw was probably these guys who i wondered if they were part of the Young Zulu Warriors who i’d seen at the rootsville festi a couple of years back.
Here’s a little video i caught of their performance on my lunch break.
Tony from The Lab who hosted vj workshops, vjed all night, and is to be producing Mr Elephant T.v has wrote his review of the Mr Elephant 2nd Birthday, so until he has a log in on this site (big elephant things afoot with The Lab) i’ll post it. The link one of his many excellent sites is http://www.vurt.org.uk
Tony from The Lab hosting the Vj Workshop – Photo by Dan Roblin
After three hours sleep, I’m awake! and running through the final kit checks for the train journey to Brum. Not only the Mr Elephant birthday party, but also my first VJ workshop. This will be seen as an introduction to hardware VJing using the Edirol kit I have now assembled. With an early start to these preceeding scheduled for 3pm, it’s all hands on decks wilst myself and Liam setup the two rooms for the evenings mayhem and merriement. Anyway, the hardware tutorials went (I think) well, and the star pupil without a shadow of doubt was Charly. Talk about getting it quickly or duck to water (or do feel free to enter your own analogy for that matter) anyhow, I digress ….
Even when I cheekily stepped away from the mixer for a bit and watched, I was bloody impressed! Hopefully though, the participants of the said workshop enjoyed themselves and have a smidge of a better understanding of what a hardware VJ actually does (apart from getting asked to put on some abba or R n bloody bee). Throughout the workshop, Mr Elephants two superb guest camera ops (Jack Braybant and Julie Hyland) were running around the event capturing loads of footage from the setup, the workshops and into the night. I can’t wait to see the footage and begin the editing for Mr E TV!
The night kicked off with a superb loop set from Laura Louise in which I had the oppertunity to play with the mixer and get in some nice feedback effects for her entire set with additional content coming from Liam (Blendstate). Caught up with Mike Freear of Alphadrive before his gig too, absolute top bloke !!! I loved the music! (I danced the whole set!), the energy (did I mention I danced the whole set?), and the reaction of all those sweaty, jumping about bods that were at the front of the stage! and then the finalae from Marc Reck himself was a joy to VJ to. This gentle reader then led to an early morning unwind back at the hostess of the night’s abode. Thanks must go to Laura for the music, hospitality and tea.
As per usual though, there were so many people that came together to macke this an absolute blinder of an event, and I’d like to thank Marc and Pyn for encouraging me to actually begin with the workshops that have been on a drawing board for so long, Liam for lights, visuals and his siter workshop on software vjing, Rich batsford for an amazing set, the osmosis boys for a storming night of techno and heavy breaks (class work!), Charley for participating and playing!, Laura for a storming opening set and hospitality, and Mr Mike Freear and Alphadrive! Hope to catch ya when you visit these lands further south.
Sleep however, never came … and around half nine I was off on my train travels again back to Leicester for the finale of my weekend!
It’s something else to actually see some of the energy and preparation that goes into creating such a mammal and Marc and Pyn have it down to a tee. The revellers were taken on an ecletic evening of sound and light that puts all of the Leicester events to shame. I look forwards to working closer with Marc and Pyn over the coming months and can wholeheartedly recommend that everyone has to experiance a Mr Elephant party at least three times in their life.
For anyone who is interested in trying out the free mr elephant workshops on saturday here’s the programme.
All workshops are FREE, and are aim to give you a taster of various creative artforms in a grassroots stylee.
Some are drop in, Some are tasters, and some will enable suitable participants to perform on the night.
If you want to try out any of the workshops, booking will be on a 1st come 1st served basis from 2pm as from the drop in workshops.
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Main Room : (These workshops must be booked from 2pm on the day)
3.15 – 4.15 – LYRICS and LOOPS – Laura Louise – All Ages
4.30– 5.30 – DRUMMING – Jon Elliot – All Ages
5.45 – 6.15 – BEAT BOXING – Bass6 – Adults
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Room 2 : (These workshops must be booked from 2pm on the day)
3.00 – 3.30 – V.J WORKSHOP The Lab/Blendstate – Adults
4.00 – 4.30 – V.J WORKSHOP The Lab/Blendstate – Adults
4.45 – 5.15 – D.J TASTER WORKSHOP – Marc Reck – Adults
5.30– 6.00 – V.J WORKSHOP – The Lab/Blendstate – Adults
6.15 – 7.00 – D.J SCRATCH WORKSHOP – Jerome Hill (t.b.c) – Adults
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The Garage : (Drop in workshops from 3pm and 7pm – no need to book)
ANIMATION – (to be shown as part of the V.J set on the night) – Claire Evans – All Ages
MASK DECORATING – (Decorate a card mask/elephant flyer) – Jen Commins – All Ages
POODLE PUPPETS – (Poodles will be part of the performance) – Pyn Stockman – All Ages
POI SPINNING – (Festival style poi in the Sun) – Alice Branston – All Ages
(All ages welcome (children must be accompanied by an adult at all times)
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The sun is shining, and the forecast for saturday is hot, so here’s the evenings entertainment for our 12 hour 2nd birthday this Saturday @ the Hare & Hounds.
Please note the Acoustic & Live Stage will be in Room 1 & the Osmosis Room & Dance Stage will be in Room 2.
For the acoustic sets (9pm – 10pm) we will have tables and candles, so please arrive early in order to get a seat and relax with a beer, so you can see the very special acoustic gig from Rich Batsford & Laura Louise.
Acoustic Stage (8pm – 10pm)
8pm – Doors Open (Live Stage) – Soundtrack music
9pm – Laura Louise (Live Loop Pedal / Flute / Beatbox / Vocals)
9.30- Rich Batsford (Piano & Vocals)
Live Stage (10pm – 3am) (Hosted by Bass6)
10pm-Jam Jah (Reggae)
11pm – Circadia (Live Instruments, Electronics, & Skankin)
11.30pm – Marc Reck (Monkey Swing Set)
12pm – The Mr Elephant Midnight Parade (Hosted By Bass6) – Parade Your Mask & Promenade Your Poodle – Prizes for best mask and poodle plus the Percussion Jam (Drummers welcome), Interactive Performers (Their Dogs may bite) & the return of the Kazoos.
12.30 – Dub Fx (Amazing Orchestral Beatbox!)
1.15 – Alphadrive (Live Dub, Breaks & Drum & Bass)
2am – Marc Reck, Bass6 & Mike Freer Celebration Rinseout.
3am – Banana Boat Song!
Dance Stage (10pm – 3am) – Hosted By Osmosis
10pm – Hijacker (Osmosis Resident )
11pm – 32DM (Very Special Birthday Set)
12.15 – Jerome Hill (International Techno Breaks Legend)
1.45 – Dk Roon (El Presidento)
3am – Just one more!
As always if you’d like to get involved with Midnight Parade and/or win a prize, then make sure you make your mask (Cut out/Decorate Mr Elephant flyer) before midnight , or create your Poodle in the day.
If you are a drummer and want to have a jam at midnight, then bring your drum or email us at mrelephantpresents@gmail.com
N.B – Please note that this is a Not for Profit event, and tickets are (always) based on the venue’s maximum capacity to cover as many of the costs as possible.
NB 2- Entry into the the event will be from the back of the Room 1, (which you access from the “rear smoking garden”) & there will be a steward on the stairs to guide you if you haven’t been to the venue before.
Hope you have a huge bank holiday celebration whatever you do, and the doors always open if you want to get involved with the next Mr Elephant event or workshops – mrelephantpresents@gmail.com
P.S In order to thank everyone for the huge amount of work that has gone into this event, we will be having a free party the following week at the Adam & Eve on Sat 30th May til 4am, so please look out for the invite.
This copied from our Mr Elephant website
p style=”text-align: center;”>After 2 years and 14 events at 6 of our favourite Birmingham venues, the time has come to celebrate Mr Elephant’s 2nd birthday with our biggest festival style celebration to date, featuring lots of interactivity for all ages, the launch of Elephant Workshops in conjunction with Dramask, and the community based Elephant Tv project in partnership with The Lab.
On Saturday 23rd May 2009 @ the Hare and Hounds, Kings Heath, Birmingham, we have a 12 hour, 4 room event over 3 stages, featuring a great lineup and a 3am license. Alongside some groundbreaking international artists, we will also be shining a light on some grassroots workshops and inspirational birmingham artists, promoters, bands, djs, vjs, and local orgs, with plenty of ways for everyone of all ages and tastes to get involved with the festivities.
A Live Stage, A Dance Stage, An Acoustic Stage, A programme of workshops, and local stalls will be the main focus of the 12 hour celebration at the award winning Hare & Hounds venue in Kings Heath Birmingham. As always local artists, and local promoters will be the main feature, though this time we’ve invited a few international artists too.
N.B – Here follows a little background on the workshops, so scroll down if you’re more interested in checking the music side of things
At the first event back in 2007, we invited all to get involved by either playing percussion with our Samba guests, decorating a mask and parading in the midnight parade to win some booze, dressing up and interacting with our interactive performers aka The Tourists. A year later, and the percussion parade, and interactive performance is now totally made up of Da’locals, with local organisations, the midnight parade has grown with each big event, and local shops and creatives are hosting stalls, with many friends of the elephant now developing their own creative practices by being more integrally involved with the events in whatever their area of interest is, mainly on the events side and workshops side.
The main addition/difference this time will be the evolution of the mr elephant workshops. The workshops began as decorating card masks, followed by 2 family/all ages welcome days, which featured a range of drop in activities for all ages from mask making and djing to drum skinning and juggling.
We always wanted the workshops to enable the participants where suitable to perform at the events in a more involved way, so we are very happy to say that this will be a part of our 2nd birthday with a range of free workshops open to the local community of all ages. Drumming, Beatboxing, Poi, Vjing, Animation, Mask Decorating, Juggling, and of course poodle making will all feature from 3pm – 7pm in our workshop area from a host of great workshop facilitators, with the masks and poodle making materials available on the evening too.
The poodles have been so well recieved that they will also feature in the performance (another open door for any budding performers, no experience necessary) with all poodles being judged in the midnight mask poodle percussion parade. Masks will also as always be available to decorate (the flip side of the flyers so keep hold of them) with materials (and masks/flyers) being provided for all.
Participants of the animation workshop will see their creations live in the visuals on the nights on either the live or dance stage. Participants of the vj workshop will get the opportunity to capture, and perform live in front of a full audience, with online support after the event, and the drummers will be invited to perform in the midnight parade (providing we can find enough drums), and there will be range of other interactive workshops and demonstrations to give the local community an opportunity to try out these various creative practices, all for free in a grassroots, comfortable and accessible environment.
We are and have always been not for profit collective, and are currently not funded in anyway with all of us involved with the event,( including all workshop providers working for free, with costs of the event at just under £2000.
We have a commitment to keeping the entry fee at the minimum, as want the event to be accessible to as many people as possible so there are some £5 early bird tickets available for people on low income, with the main advance ticket price at £7. As the capacity is around 300 at the hare and hounds, there are only 50 of these available.
Grassroots approach seems to be working though, as we’ve already had already a huge interest from workshop providers and people wanting to get involved with the next event, and we will be applying for our first funding to support another full programme of workshops at the next big mr elephant due for the summer.
This is kind of an elephant experiment and can only work with the support of the local community, so if you do like what you see, please think about passing on the email to 10 friends, and if you are on facebook, we really appreciate inviting as many facebook friends to the event, and/or the group as you have time to click on… Really does make keeping in touch with interested or local people a whole lot easier.
Alongside the workshops (3pm – 7pm folks) there will be stalls from local people from reflexology to local art, sone fine drinks promos courtesy of the hare and hounds, interactive performance from james, dom and the crew, the mr elephant midnight mask poodle parade featuring local percussionists (with prizes for best mask and poodle made), multi projector visuals from Vj Blendstate & The Lab, and a whole lot more….
We are more than excited to have this guy down from Bristol on the 23rd May 2009. He’s one of the best beatbox and loop pedal artists we’ve seen, and just check out his youtube videos for what you can expect. On heavy rotation on the mr elephant radio show, and one of Bass6’s recommendations, Dubfx is an inspiring artist, and we are going to be making a lot of noise about his incredible skills. He has a new album out on May 30th, and his last cd is available from his website… well worth a tenner.
An introduction to what he does (worth watching these through)
Jamming on the street
At Glastonbury Stone Circle
At Glastonbury on stage (Apologies for sound quality)
Our other headliners for the 2009 may bank holiday gig on sat May 23rd, these guys are quickly gaining a reputation for being one of the freshest live dance acts around showcasing “a perfect fusion of danceable dub, breaks and electronica” (Raise the Roof Festival”. Following a string of high profile appearances at UK festivals and club nights, this up-and-coming live trio have supported acts such as: Atomic Hooligan, Beardyman, The Bays, DJ Deekline, Tayo, Rogue Element, Scratch Perverts, and DJ Yoda. Definitly one to watch.
What can we say about the beatboxer Bass6, a true grassroots star in our opinion. With superb hosting skills, a inspiring attitude and a huge range of skills from beatboxing to workshops, this guy really brings the vibes, with his own productions are opening doors all over the country. He hosted our Midnight poodle parade on the beach at Celebrate Brums Underground, and he’s back for our next big event on Sat 23rd May 2009…not to be missed.
Hosting our last mr elephant midnight poodle parade competition
These guys have really come into their own this year, and one of the reasons why we are chuffed that they will be performing at our 2nd birthday. They house a great line up of talented musicians, which include multiskilled instrumentalist Jon Elliot has been one of the percussionists since our 2nd event.
Osmosis is a a co-operative run by a group of people who are passionate about their music and sharing it with like minded people. Each member of the crew has given their talent, equipment and time freely with any money made being ploughed back in to improve lighting, decor, sound, produce free CDs, and if we’re really lucky, buy us a couple of drinks.
Supported by the vibrant and eclectic venue, Rootys (rip), Osmosis has developed a reputation for it’s atmosphere, music and support of local talent, with names like Paul Damage (1881 Recordings/House of God), Sir Real (House of God) , and Sub Citizen (Resistor Records/Inukshuk) joining Residents and local heroes DK Roon’, Mack, Dr Pepperspray, HijACKER and M-AK.
A huge techno and breaks artist, and an international legend in his own right, we can’t quite get our hat on that he’s going to be headlining the dance Osmosis stage! Prepare yourselves.
Live at Glade (Apologies for Sound quality)
Scratch Practice
We couldn’t find any footage of their residents aside from the osmosis myspace link, so will be looking for mixes to help promote in the next week or two. Suffice to say Osmonauts need no introduction, and their programming and residents skills are hugely respected in the Birmingham Underground. Osmosis have organised legendary packed out parties from day one, and always attract the friendliest crowd of people you could hope to meet on a night out.This will be their first outing at the hare and hounds, so we look forward to a lot of warmth and phat music on the evening.
The other dj appearing is our own resident Marc Reck who will be playing either swing or a live eclectic set on the main stage, or a big room breaks techno, and drum and bass set on the dance stage. Here’s a recent clip of the end of his gig at the Night Times at the Custard Factory.
A core member of Project X Presents, one of Birmingham’s finest piano players, and all round top bloke, Rich Batsford is one of Birminghams’s musical treasures, and his music has been compared to that of the great steve reich, Keith Jarret, Michael Nyman, Claude Debussy, and Brian Eno. His debut album is currently free to download on his website, and his live performances are not to be missed. Check the valentines day Mr Elephant Radio show for a live recording of a gig from 2007.
Rich Batsford – Namaste
Live at Project X Presents
Laura Louise – www.myspace.com/lauralouiseowen – Hailing from New Zealand, Laura is a huge talent, and somewhat undiscovered on these shores. An amazing voice, and multi instrumentalist, s
Pyn Stockman is a very talented mask maker, performer, drama practiioner, workshop leader..the list goes on. The mask making though is something that is one of her driving forces, and where a lot of her dreams and ambitions lie. Recently she was asked by Paul Murphy to create a wolf mask for Louis Robinson from The Destroyers for a forthcoming performance at the town hall entitled Sir Rhubarb & The Green Wolf.
I always strive to make the show really eclectic, but with a lot of flow, so check out the tracklistings to get the vibes of various shows. Your comments and feedback are always welcome.
Night Times Breaks Reviewer
I review breakbeat for the monthly Night Times publication and play all sorts of music for my radio show so feel free to send yours via this drop box.
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