Inspiring Communities was a year-long programme of music, drama and art projects, funded by the Scottish Arts Council (now Creative Scotland). During 2010, we worked in every area in Perth and Kinross with all ages and abilities to create new and exciting work which was then exhibited in Perth Concert Hall and Theatre.
samaagam
Over the course of 7 weeks, pupils from St John's Academy and Our Lady's, alongside adults from various communities of Perth and Kinross, took part in Indian music and dance workshops to try to re-create some of the music from the piece Samaagam written by David Murphy, Amjad Ali Khan and the SCO Lab players. The Samaagam concert was on Wednesday 10 March 2010 and the pupils and adults performance created the first half of the concert.
The second half of the concert featured a solo by Sarod virtuoso Amjad Ali Khan followed by the performance of Samaagam in full, played by Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Amjad Ali Khan, conducted by David Murphy. This was the only performance of Samaagam in Scotland in 2010.
carnival
Carnival was one of our biggest projects to date and was an extremely successful event with over 800 people in the Carnival procession, 3500 in the plaza at its busiest and over 5000 people participating in the hall during the afternoon participating in activities. We ran 6 residencies, beginning in May 2010 and ending on Sat 18 Sep 2010 with a huge Carnival procession through the streets of Perth, culminating in a day long concert on an outdoor stage next to Perth Concert Hall. The parade was split into three sections Brazil, Nigeria and Scotland.
The residencies were:
- Afrobeat: led by Dele Sosimi - singing project with 6 local primary schools and the Perth African Community and local brass players
- Capoeira: we led Capoeira workshops (Brazilian dance-martial art) in 43 primary schools throughout Perth and Kinross involving 3200 children.
- Street Dance: Matt Foster and David Hughes from Random Aspekts and David Highes Dance Company led a week-long residency in street and contemporary dance for young people during Summer 2010
- Hip Hop Shakespeare: The Hip Hop Shakespeare Company, led by chart topping rapper Akala, ran a residency using Shakespeare as a stimulus for creating musical rhymes to hip hop beats. They worked in North Perth with young people aged 15 - 18years who didn't attend school or college.
- Graffiti Workshops: We ran free graffiti and street-art workshops all over Perth and Kinross for families. The participants of these created artwork which was displayed in the Carnival parade and outside the concert hall on carnival day.
- Costume residency: All the costumes in the parade were made by community and schools participants, led by our Carnival professional artists.
Lightnight Perth
Only Boys Allowed:Take 2
Only Boys Allowed: Take 2 built on the success of our previous all boys singing day in 2009. We commissioned male Gaelic singers Na Seòid to write a 10 minute piece for the boys to sing. Andy Howitt choreographed the movement, alongside a team of male dancers from YDance (Scottish Youth Dance). Na Seòid led a CPD (Continuing Professional Development) workshop for visiting primary music specialists then we ran ten cluster workshops in November where the boys learned the music and dance before they came together on Friday 26 November to rehearse and then perform the new piece under the light of Wang Yuyang's Artificial Moon. We involved 65 out of 76 primary schools who had signed up to the project giving us a total of 984 primary 3 - 5 boys participating in the event. The event was extremely successful. We had so many friends and family arrive to watch the performance that we had to hold some people in the foyer and set up plasma screens with live streaming to accommodate all audience!
St Andrew's Day Big Sing
This was a fantastic evening for music and for Gaelic in particular. The theme of the event was the cultures and traditions of Scotland and China. The evening took the form of 20 minute performances, with various activities both Scottish and Chinese taking place in between performances.
We involved 8 community choirs, ranging in age from 12 years - 92 years old! Each choir was paired with a professional Scottish or Chinese musician/s and performed 3 songs with their musician, one of which was written by local schools.
All other choirs met with their musician roughly 3 times before the event. Corrina Hewat arranged 2 songs for the finale of the event which was held at 11.45pm. All choirs came together to sing ‘All You Need Is Love' and ‘Auld Lang Syne' in Mandarin, Gaelic and English, under the light of the ‘Artificial Moon'.
A big THANK YOU to all choirs, artists and schools involved:
Choirs: Craigie Community Choir, Encore, Earn Singers, Glenalmond Chapel Choir, Melody Movers, Horsecross Glee and Aberfeldy Gaelic Choir
Artists: Grace, Hewat, Polwart Trio, Mary Ann Kennedy and Na Seòid, Hao Yun, Harmony Ensemble and Black Voices
Schools: Kinross High School, Crieff High School, Perth High School, Perth Academy, Perth Grammar School, Breadalbane Academy (secondary), Goodlyburn Primary (Gaelic Medium Unit) and Blairgowrie High School.
Lighting Workshops and installations
Wang Yuyang's Artificial Moon came from Shanghai, China to Perth, Scotland and was erected on Thursday 25 November in the Gannochy Auditorium for the weekend's events. It was then moved to the foyer of Perth Concert Hall where it remains until March 2011.
KMA, lighting duo Kit Monkman and Tom Wexler, installed The Hive onto the plaza outside Perth Conce, a large scale interactive installation which is exciting, accessible and which the public thoroughly engaged with...at one point, we had people queuing to get onto the display.
Thriller
During the day of the Big Sing, we engaged 40 people aged 16 - 56yrs in a Michael Jackson ‘Thriller' workshop. The participants received stage make-up classes to ‘Zombie-fy' themselves and also were taught the Thriller dance. Over 600 people watched the performance the ‘zombies' gave.
Throughout Lightnight we also held extra entertainment including, Famous Grouse running a free stall, Chinese Calligraphy name-writing workshops, extra interactive lighting displays, rickshaw rides to AK Bell Library, Scottish Storytelling and themed food and drink. We also had performances in the foyer throughout the evening from Glenalmond Pipe Band, Royal Scottish Country Dance Society Perth and Perthshire Branch, Thriller (see below), Trio Stage Academy and the cast of Aladdin (Perth Theatre Panto).
contact details
For more information on Samaagam, Carnival or Lightnight, please contact Jenn Minchin, on 01738 477 722 or jminchin@horsecross.co.uk