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Tinderbox Orchestra’s Last Week at the Fringe

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We are absolutely delighted to have received our first 5 star review from Binge Fringe, as well as 4 star reviews from The Scotsman and Three Weeks Edinburgh.

This is the last week of our show with just 3 shows left to go this Thu-Sat, and it is totally sold out!  

Huge thank you to everyone who has come along to see us so far and who have booked tickets to our shows this week, we can’t wait to play to you all again! 

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We’d like to say a massive thank you to Made in Scotland for including us in their showcase, Edinburgh Libraries for letting us use this incredible space, our wonderful collaborators Jellyman’s Daughter, Housekind, Probably Edible, Culture Clan, and Hannah McCooke a poet at Craigmillar Library who worked with us to create a unique piece for the libraries.  

We’d also like to thank everyone who has helped to support our musical instrument library campaign by donating their instruments, cash donations, or just helping to spread the word. 

Click the button below to help support our musical instrument libraries campaign.

donate
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New Single ‘Tribes’ | 30.06.23

We are very excited to announce that our new single ‘Tribes’ with local rapper Thomas Murray aka. Probably Edible will be released on Friday 30th June 2023! 

The track is a powerful combination of rap, heavy guitars, and orchestra instrumentation, reminiscent of Rage Against the Machine.  We can’t wait for you to hear it!

Click the button below to listen to ‘Tribes’.

Listen to 'tribes'
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Tinderbox at Edinburgh Hospital for Sick Children

Over the past few months we ran a residency programme in collaboration with ECHC for the first time where Rhys worked with young people in the hospital to create a piece of music for the Tinderbox Orchestra. The piece was created through music workshops in the hospital’s ‘Jess Mackie Music Garden’. The final piece titled ‘Seeds of Sound’ was performed in the hospital on the 4th of December and was said to have been one of the best attended events in the hospital this year! 
 
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Rhys & Kieran jamming at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Edinburgh.

Photo – Edinburgh Children’s Hospital Charity

One of the great things about having a weekly workshop in RHCYP is that we have the opportunity to work with young people throughout their stay. Rhys met Kieran when he was 16 years old and he had never written a song before. Kieran was in for a long stay, which ended up being around 6 months, on and off, and had his guitar with him for the duration. Through the weekly workshops and lessons, he quickly started to write songs and perform for the nurses who visited him. Fast forward to now, a year later, Kieran has continued to partake in Tinderbox workshops, has written an album’s worth of material, performed 2 of his songs live with the Tinderbox Orchestra and performed at 4 concerts. 

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Kieran & Rhys performing at the Edinburgh Children's Hospitals Charity's All Wrapped up Event at the Central Hall, Edinburgh.

Photo – Edinburgh Children’s Hospital Charity

“Meeting Rhys was a breath of fresh air. I had my guitar in the hospital and when Rhys came in with his, we immediately started jamming. Rhys taught me a few new songs and gave me some good advice about writing my own music. I played my guitar more than ever during my hospital stays, sometimes for more than 6 hours a day so my technique improved at a fast pace!” – Kieran

We would like to say a huge thank you to our hospitals team Rhys, Claire, Shea, and Jamie for the wonderful work they do with the children & young people there, and to Edinburgh Children’s Hospitals Charity for having us as part of their Arts Programme all year. 

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Dnipro Kids Music Project

In August 2022, we started a Music Project for 11–18-year-old Ukrainian
refugees at Milton Campus, Edinburgh college.

The project consisted of 9 guitar sessions over the period of one month. The project was focused on guitar, but also included 5 drum clinics and flexibility to teach more instruments. 

The group of young people we got involved with are coming from a Ukrainian orphanage supported by the Scottish charity “Dnipro Kids Appeal”. The charity helped them to get to Scotland from their city “Dnipropetrovsk”, after the war in Ukraine started. We were aware that these young people have been in traumatic situations way before the war started, so we took extra care in our teaching and youth work approach.

 

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The attendance was great with almost 20 kids interested in attending the lessons more or less regularly. The young people were split into groups of a maximum of 5 people according to their past experience. There were complete beginners and quite advanced players who have attended music courses in Ukraine. The lessons covered various concepts and the young people were welcome to request certain topics or songs to be learnt. The lessons were thought in Ukrainian; however, English terminology knowledge was encouraged, and the material provided was written in both Ukrainian and English to facilitate their later transition into school and to help them with English. 

During the first week of the project, we assessed each participant’s abilities on guitar and settled on certain topics and goals for the term. Tinderbox also pupil each participant with a guitar to practice, both electric and acoustic depending on their preference. Although the project lasted one month, the guitars were available to them for two months to encourage practice and self-study afterwards. The young people were very involved in the lessons and had questions and the will to learn certain songs and techniques. The tutor Alina gave them guitar tablatures and scores for a few songs and each pupil was free to learn which one they preferred and then play it in the next lessons for the group, if they felt comfortable doing so. A run-down over the essentials on guitar was also offered to all the pupils, to make sure there were no gaps in knowledge before going forwards. A similar approach was taken by the drums tutor who assessed the pupils abilities with drumming techniques and decided on the content of his next cliniques. There were two to three people in their drums group more or less regularly. 



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The last week of the lessons was focused on clearing any gaps or doubts about what was covered during the term. The musical repertoire learnt over the term was also consolidated so that the pupils could perform it at their “Ukrainian Independence Day Celebration Exhibition”. A small private concert was organized by their community in the halls of Edinburgh College. This offered an amazing occasion to show off the knowledge and skills that they gained over the past month. On the last lesson, the tutor made sure to offer direction and support for the pupils’ self-study after the end of the project. The students expressed their enjoyment for the project and even wrote cards with a personalized thank you note. 

Overall, the project was a success and offered the refugees a creative escape from their recent traumatic events. Their musicality was also developed and maintained thanks to the availability of guitars and drums to practice on. Moreover, some students had the opportunity to explore both electric and acoustic guitars and changed their mind about the complete “separation” of the classical and contemporary approach on the instrument. For example, some classical guitarists were not engaging with electric guitars or the use of plectrum in the first lesson considering it was something that did not relate to their musical experience. At the end of the lesson, after seeing some of their peers playing they requested to have an electric guitar even if they already had their own classic guitar. The tutor was pleased to see that the group of young people got more united, and everyone’s musical experience was enriched. 

A few weeks after the project’s end, the tutor Alina was offered to play a concert for Ukrainian refugees in Stirling. The participants were encouraged to join in and take the opportunity to perform in front of a bigger and new audience. Three of the participants agreed to perform, this really benefited their confidence and musicality on their instruments. We are looking forward to being able to provide more music lessons for Ukrainian young people to support them in a moment of need and make sure that their passion for music is encouraged. 


By Alina Levanova

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Tinderbox Orchestra Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Fringe – the biggest arts festival in the world!  The city is filled with 10s of 1000s of different performers, and it is the perfect opportunity for performers to showcase themselves and perform to international audiences. 

We thought about what our show would look like and how long a run we thought we could manage. In true Tinderbox style, we decided to GO FOR IT and decided on a 13 show run over the first three weeks of August with 10 different collaborators and a catalogue of brand new compositions. We were lucky enough that our friends at the Pianodrome were taking over the Old Royal High for the summer (including the fringe) and gave us the opportunity to take over the Grand Hall – a room once intended to be the debating chamber for the Scottish Parliament.

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Our collaborators for the fringe were a huge mix of artists that we have worked with before, members of the collective who have their own music projects and some brand new collaborations too. 

We had Chinese alternative folk-punk artist Song Yuzhe in the opening weekend. Followed Trad-inspired indie folk singer ‘Housekind’, Edinburgh based psychedelic rock band ‘Duke Duncan and the Hurricanes’, Electro-pop Artist PINLIGHT and Indie singer songwriter Brave Little Note. And in the final week, we finished things off alt- folk duo Jellyman’s Daughter, rap and poetry collective ‘ Culture Clan’ and improvisational trio (and also Pianodrome’s creative directors) S!nk. 

We were also joined with drummers and puppeteers from Kathputli Colony an extraordinary community of traditional artists in Delhi that we met and collaborated with online through a project called The Samata Sessions which you can read more about here.

After lots of work from our marketing team (Somya and Leo – you wonderfully talented humans!) and selling the show to EVERYONE we knew- it was SHOWTIME. 

I can really put into words adequately, the feeling I had on the opening day of our show. ‘WAS THIS A GOOD IDEA?’, ‘ARE PEOPLE GOING TO COME?’ ‘HAVE WE REHEARSED ENOUGH’? I wasn’t sure at all. However, I did know that I was surrounded by incredible musicians who had worked really hard to create an exciting and unique showcase of wonderful music. And even if we had a small audience or made a few mistakes- it wouldn’t REALLY matter because we were doing something exciting and new AND we were getting to do it together.

The doors were open and the audience started piling in, I kept waiting for the queue to die down but it didn’t and very quickly the room filled up. Our first show and an audience of 130 people came along to support us. The music started and the energy in the room was electric. The set flew by and what felt like a minute later was the end of our first show and the audience were on their feet to meet us with a standing ovation. I looked around the room in amazement as pure pride and joy waved over me. We had done it! The first show was a success.

From then on, our show was met with standing ovations and sold-out crowds. Friends, family, colleagues, young people from our youth projects and their families all came to support along with new audiences- people who had seen us busking during the day or people who had read about us or seen us play at a festival over the summer. It was exhausting and a huge amount of work but more importantly, it was inspiring, exciting and also gave us this unique opportunity to hang out together all month- socialising, making music and having FUN. 

A friend of mine who came to see the show said ‘I just kept crying because I’ve never seen so many people on stage performing together who just look like they all love it and each other so much’ and that’s exactly what it was like. I think about it constantly- how lucky I am that I get to stand on stage and perform such amazing music with such a wonderful group of people.

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1 Week to go! – Instrument Libraries Crowdfunder

It’s  the last week of our Instrument Library crowdfunder – we’re at just under 75% of our target and need to raise another £1300k.

We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has helped support the project so far!

If you would like to help us reach our target and support the project, all donations are a huge help, and greatly appreciated!

donate here

We Make Music Instrument Libraries is a brand new initiative to get musical instruments into public libraries across Scotland, so people will be able to borrow them for free, just like taking out a book! The programme is launching with nine libraries in Fife, North Ayrshire and Edinburgh, with the intention that it spreads further across Scotland in future.

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We want to fill these libraries with as many musical instruments and learning resources as we can.  All money will go towards buying, repairing and servicing donated instruments and getting them into the libraries in good condition. We also want to buy music software and midi keyboards so people can start making music on library computers. Once the instruments are in the libraries, we want to offer music workshops and introductory lessons, develop online resources, and organise live music events in and around the libraries. The more money we raise and the more instruments people donate, the more music libraries we can open up around Scotland!

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Celtic Connections – Tinderbox Orchestra & Kathryn Joseph

Celtic Connections is Glasgow’s annual folk, roots and world music festival that takes place every January- it was also Tinderbox Orchestra’s first gig of 2022! After the release of our Kathryn Joseph EP (Here is the link if you haven’t had the chance to listen yet: ), we were lucky enough to share the stage with Kathryn at Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall on the 29th January. 

In the lead up to the gig, the orchestra rehearsed every Sunday and had a set of rehearsals the week of – which was quite tricky due to COVID restrictions. We were lucky enough that North Edinburgh Arts and The Pear Tree let us use their spaces.

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We worked on our own hour-long set along with the three beautiful Kathryn Joseph pieces that we recorded for our EP- The Blood, The Weight and The Weary. In addition to our usual orchestra line-up we were also lucky enough to be joined by a small singing ensemble that was made up of tutors from our community projects. 

On the day of the gig, bursting with excitement and nerves, we piled into cars and drove over to Glasgow early for our set up and sound check. A quick rehearsal, some dinner and a big group warm-up later, we were ready to go on and perform our set.

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We started our set with Tinderbox classic ‘Bethany Lane’ and instantly felt an energy and warmth from the audience. The set flew by and before we knew it we were finishing in true celtic style with ‘Cas Na Caora’, a piece arranged by our cello player Graham Coe. It was then time for our collaboration with Kathryn- a project started in 2019 with the EP which we were only just able to perform together in front of an audience. The three pieces- orchestrated so wonderfully by Sam Irvine, Luci Holland and Jack Nissan captivated the audience, bringing tears to many (including Kathryn’s eyes). A huge congratulations to all the musicians and team who worked so tirelessly to make the collaboration so beautiful and successful. Celtic Connections with Kathryn Joseph in 2022 will forever be a highlight for Tinderbox Orchestra.

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Bridgend Farmhouse – Tinderbox Orchestra & Shooglenifty!

A gorgeous sunny, spring day at Bridgend Farmhouse. Tinderbox Orchestra kicking the day off with some classic tunes before Shooglenifty took the stage. LOTS AND LOTS OF DANCING. Can you imagine a better way to spend a Saturday afternoon in March? 

As part of Shooglenifty’s community tour, we were asked if we wanted to join them at Bridgend Farmhouse in mid December 2021 but due to covid restrictions the gig was postponed until – what actually, was the perfect day for it- Saturday 26th March.

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The whole day was filled with joy, incredible music and a real sense of community. Children, Adults and everyone in between were on their feet dancing for the entirety of Shooglenifty’s set and when the gig was over, we all packed up with a huge smile on our faces. 

 A huge thank you to Shooglenifty, Joe Peat (Sound Engineer), Bridgend Farmhouse and to the Tinderbox Team who helped make everything happen!



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Tuesday Hub at North Edinburgh Arts

It’s been the biggest ever term we’ve had of our Tuesday Hub at North Edinburgh Arts! Thanks to everyone who’s come along to share their enthusiasm and creativity this term and thanks to the brilliant team at NEA for all their support. 

We’d usually have a term of 8 or 9 sessions but we were so keen to get back while restrictions allowed that we’ve run 15 sessions this term. Before term started our biggest worry was that we wouldn’t be able to get young people back out after being locked down for so long. After only 2 weeks our biggest worry was that we wouldn’t have room for everyone who wanted to come!

There have been so many highlights. One of the big ones was meeting young people who we had been working with at the online music school in real life for the first time.

Another one was welcoming Robert back to us who came all the way through from Glasgow to see us. It’s amazing to see his progress.

It was also great to have a visit from the Scottish Culture Minister, Jenny Gilruth.

We’re really looking forward to getting started in our new venue at Muirhouse Millenium Centre next term while North Edinburgh Arts undergoes a huge refurbishment and development.

In the meantime, thanks to everyone who has been involved this term and have a wonderful holiday!

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Craigroyston Community High School S1 Bands

We love Craigroyston Community High School! It’s such an important part of the success of our work in North Edinburgh that we have a strong partnership with our closest neighbourhood school and you couldn’t ask for a better partner.

This term we were overjoyed to get back to face to face work in the school with our S1 bands project. 

Every S1 class formed as a band with pupils being given the choice of playing drum kit, guitar, keyboard or singing. We asked classes to choose what song they would like to work on and then spent the whole term working up the material.

We have seen so much talent and enthusiasm especially on the back of such difficult time with absolutely no singing and hardly any instrumental tuition for so long we weren’t sure what to expect, but the pupils did themselves proud.

Teachers reported that the project has really helped give a post-covid lift and helped re-engage some pupils who had stopped joining in with music.

Really looking forward to getting started with the S2s next year!

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Victoria Primary School

‘The oldest school in Edinburgh is moving across the road, we take it with us all the way, it’s not a heavy load’

This year’s songwriting project with Victoria Primary School was unusual to say the least.

When we started the project we were planning to have a Tinderbox tutor leading over Microsoft Teams to pupils on their iPads in the classroom. Sadly the school wifi wasn’t able to cope and we ended up falling back to our more familiar approach of having the tutor on the smart board in the classroom. Happily, by the end of the project, restrictions had started to lift and we were able to get into school to finish off the song, rehearse it and record it. At the last minute we spontaneously did a bit of filming to make a quick music video. Sometimes things just fall into place!

The pupils were incredibly thoughtful and creative in writing their song to commemorate the closure of current school site and the move across the road to the new building which is going to be happening very soon. Once again it shows how well the community of Newhaven keeps their heritage alive in the hearts and minds of the young people of Victoria Primary.

 

 

 

Tinderbox Collective worked with pupils at Victoria Primary School in Edinburgh to write and record a song to commemorate the moving of Victoria Primary school from it’s current site to a new site nearby. The school has stood on the current site for 176 years making it the oldest school in Edinburgh.

Thanks to:

The pupils at Victoria Primary School – Vocals and Songwriting

The Wee Museum – Photos and Images

Tinderbox Collective musicians –

Max Lamprecht – String Arrangement

Claire Docherty – Vocals

Erin McGonigle – Violin

Anna Fraser – Drums

Jed Milroy – Guitar

Liam Dempsey – Production

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Howdenhall Project 2021

 

2021 brought us another fantastic partner project with Howdenhall School who provide secure residential care and education for young people aged 10-17 with significant social, emotional and behavioural needs.

Over the last few years we have developed a project that uses rap writing, computer game design, music production, composition and songwriting to produce a whole load of creative outcomes in a really accessible and fun way that can engage people who often struggle to have the self confidence and emotional ability to make the most of these kinds of activities. It really helps to have our own orchestra to pull it all together at the end!

Game Design

Composer, broadcaster and game designer, Luci Holland, was working with pupils to design their own games using online software called Construct.  Over 8 weeks each pupil designed their own level. They started off with their own overall idea that Luci was then able to support them to translate into code and help troubleshoot and polish up.

The pupils were able to upload their own images, artwork and music into the games to bring them to life and make them totally unique.

 

Take the challenge and have a go at trying the finished games at this link. The password is Howdenhall.

Creative Writing

Rapper, MC and Producer,  Matt Tulloch (aka Mercurius) was working with pupils to develop their lyric writing skills. Having just released his first album Matt was in a very good position to inspire the pupils and share his creative passion. The rap writing really gave pupils a chance to express themselves with honesty about their own life experiences which led to a lot of very interesting and important discussions about life and making positive choices.

Musician and Tinderbox Assistant Director, Jed Milroy, used music production apps on the ipad to help pupils to create their own pieces of digital music. This was mainly using a sequencer app called launchpad.

Once the pieces of music and lyrics were finished the pupils helped Matt to record performances of their lyrics along to the music they had created.

 

 

One pupil even incorporated some artwork they had done that illustrates their lyrics and we spontaneously made this music video!

 

Composition

Jed also worked with the pupils on composing melodies using the ipad app ‘Medley’. This amazing app makes it really easy to create melodies using a grid that represents each bar of music. The settings in the app enabled us fix the same tempo and key for all the pupils to work in which meant that we were able to put all of their melodies together at the end to make one piece.

This was then given to composer, Sam Irvine, to tweak and arrange into a piece of music for the Tinderbox Orchestra. The piece ended up being incredibly tricky and quite wild! Here’s a video of the final result.

 

It has been another fantastic project. Thanks again to all the amazing staff at Howdenhall and the YMI for their continued support. But above all, thanks to the pupils at Howdenhall who were so up for participating and sharing their talent!

 

OMS Autumn Term

Tinderbox Online Music School

The Online Music School is amazing! We’ve had so many enthusiastic, brilliant, promising young musicians along – taking on instrument lessons, writing songs, and making beats! We’re now going in to our Autumn Term ‘21 and I’m so excited to see how far everyone comes along this term. I also can’t wait to meet everyone in our “cafe space” in between lessons – hearing everyone’s performances and progress whilst chatting, listening to tunes, and playing games. 


– Liam | Tinderbox project Coordinator

Every Saturday, we’ll be running a series of fun and affordable, small group, online music lessons for young people aged 10 to 18. Tinderbox Online Music School offers a wide variety of fun and affordable online lessons from guitar, keyboard and songwriting to strings, brass, woodwind, and music production!

Lessons are available for free, or by donation.

The sign up deadline for our Autumn Term is Wednesday 25th August at 5pm!
You can sign up here: https://forms.gle/wt3yQnEcz5JpJq4m6

After our deadline, you can sign up to our waiting list!
Should a space become available we will get in touch 🙂 

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The Samata Sessions – a global composition

The First Samata Session

The Samata Sessions is an exciting new collaboration between a new collective of international artists and activists which involves bringing together global voices in dance, music, poetry, arts and other creative areas to experiment with international hybrid performances.

For this first session we had; Tinderbox Orchestra playing live original music from the Pianodrome in Edinburgh, Scotland; Indian Wedding Rockers, a high octane drumming band who are part of Kathputli Colony in Dehli, India (https://www.facebook.com/kathcolony ) ; Hadassah Louis, an amazing poet and activist from Zambia (https://www.hadassahlouis.com/books ), Chitrakoot Collective in India (https://www.instagram.com/chitrakootcollective/?utm_medium=copy_link ) , a fantastic dance group in Kenya (https://www.projectelimu.org/ ), and (http://www.creativeageinginternational.com/ ) from Ireland.

What we had in effect was a mini global festival timed so that people could tune in from far and wide.

The day started with prepping everything for the setup, this was to be an experimental session. Here, in Scotland, we gathered at the Pianodrome in a warehouse in Granton, Edinbugh. Musicians bustling in with instruments, audience members taking their seats, and finally, going live on the Zoom call that was being projected onto the wall of the warehouse

It was 3pm UK time, 4pm Zambia / 5pm Kenya / 7.30pm Delhi and with a little fine tuning, we were off to a start.

Vijay, the Dhol players and percussionists from Jagriti got everybody grooving. The urge to bhangra was very present. A smooth transition onto the Elimu dance group, where Kenyan students presented , they moved in to the drumming too! There was such elegance to their rhythms and it was beautiful to watch. We then had some evocative words of poetry read by Hadassah in Zambia, with undertones of the orchestra in the background and some percussion. This was an experimental composition and it synced in well. What a success! Suffice to say we and all the audience were moved. Chitrakoot Collective followed with sharing digital zines about their work with bettering the lives of women in their local communities. We heard words from a project called Sapno Ka Haq which translates to ‘the right to dream’, this piece involved hearing from young people about their dreams and some of the challenges they would face in accomplishing them.

We completed the session with another drumming round and it was superb. Vijay and his group can bring such liveliness to a room, even over zoom.

If you happened to miss this session, keep an eye out for any future sessions we might hold. It was an inspiring afternoon and we are keen to do it again.

Here are some snaps from the session:

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Tinderbox Orchestra at Fringe by the Sea

The Day That Was

Fringe By The Sea and the Tinderbox Orchestra

Sunday15th August 2021@North Berwick

Every week we have a team meeting and we have a round of sharing updates which we call “the week that was”. It is a nice turn of phrasing to begin each round. On Sunday the 15th of August we had our first official event since restrictions were implemented in light of Covid-19. This brought us to “the day that was”. Tinderbox Orchestra had the fantastic opportunity to play our first live gig since the pandemic began as part of Fringe By The Sea (tag). The Collective headed out to North Berwick for the event by car, bus, van, minibus, bike and motorcycle. We could gather once again and share music. It is quintessentially human to want to communicate and to express and it was a much needed moment that we all anticipated with great eagerness.



Just picture this. You walk through a beautiful garden to a path leading up to a giant blue and yellow striped tent, but this was no meagre tent. It invoked circus level energy and it was brilliant.

The stage was huge and soon enough the team got setting up. Practice and sound checks were underway. Everyone was pumped for this. Soon enough people started filtering in and there was a cacophony of sounds bouncing off the peaks of the ginormous tent, filled with children’s laughter, chatter and puppy barks!

Preparations and practice:

 

 

 

 

 

 

We started the set with our community anthem, Bethany Lane. It’s a call to bring everyone together to share music and creativity and has never felt more appropriate than for this gig. We went on to drift through the wonderland of Luci Holland’s creation that is Rimo, threw our hair around for Frazer Knox’s Quetzlequatl and were lulled by the stunning vocals of Julia Dorozynska pefroming the mighty Hailey Beavis’ ‘Daybreak’.

Have a listen to some of these pieces from our (soundcloud) – https://soundcloud.com/tinderboxcollective

As the gig progressed, people had nestled into their seats or chosen a grassy seat of their choice on the ground. This provided great fodder for the children who created grass castles and mazes.

Before we knew it, we were winding up the show in true Celtic style, jigging away to Graham Coe’s arrangement of Cas na coire. The audience were showing their full appreciation with whoops, cheers and dancing.

It felt absolutely brilliant to have the show back on the road and on the stage again! What a relief after all this time apart. We had been quite apprehensive about how everyone would feel getting back together to rehearse after all this isolation and it was very encouraging to see the band return so quickly to full form. Congratulations to all the players and team who put in the effort to make that happen!

The day did not end with the event itself, a good day never does. We packed up and progressed to the beach (we were in North Berwick after all, right by the sea). The sun shone through and things were looking sweet. In our merry group, we had orchestra singers, musicians, young participants from the Tinderbox Online Music School (link here), their families, and other supporting team who helped bring everything together.

When a beach gathering occurs, you can guess correctly that it is soon followed by pizza. We shared pizza and Jed serenaded us throughout with his wonderful singing/guitar playing and all round encouraging words. The students and others chimed in with instruments of their choice. This continued on until the afternoon and we had a blast.

The day we envisaged, was.

See more pictures here:

                                                                                   

You can check the moments from the day on our Instagram highlights: https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/18138974914201559/

 

A big thank you to all the folks in the audience, the team at the venue, Fringe by the sea, Tinderbox support staff, all of our partners/funders, and the orchestra contributors who shared their light with everyone that day.

 

 

 

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Music at The Hospital for Sick Children

A few months ago, I was asked if I would like to join some of my wonderful, fellow Tinderbox musicians and do some music sessions at the Sick Kids Hospital.

As things are only just getting less restricted, I was a bit unsure of how the sessions would run- luckily I had Rhys to show me how it’s done. I was able to shadow him for a session and we had SO MUCH FUN. We duet-ed loads of different styles of songs, visited and performed in different wards and even had a sing and dance along with the nurses!

In my first session without Rhys, I was nervous! I was unsure about what music I should play or how to ask people if they even wanted music. I was worried about playing too many songs or being too loud until I walked into a ward and met two 5 year old girls. We decided to form a girl band (as someone who DREAMED of being a Spice Girl, this was very exciting for me) and we  danced, sang and then debated the best character from ‘Frozen’ and it was wonderful.

Another memorable session was when I gave a baby in the PICU one of our shakers to shake whilst I played and sang some songs. She held onto it for so long that I almost ran out of songs (!) and when I came back the next week, her Grandma had gotten her, her own!

I think what I have learned so far through these sessions is that each week is so different and that you really can’t plan what’s going to happen- which, although slightly daunting, is really exciting! I’m really looking forward to fully finding my feet with it and to continue to share wonderful moments through music!

By Claire Docherty

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Claire Docherty and Rhys Gilchrist at the hospital.

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Action for Children

For four weeks over the summer holidays, I, along with Marion from Action for Children, ran a music making and songwriting project at St. Thomas of Addiewell Primary School in West Lothian.

The first couple of weeks were filled with lots of fun games, drumming and forming a band to learn a cover of ‘Memories’ by Maroon 5. As it was so warm we also did lots of our sessions outside- jamming together and playing the ‘find the drumstick’ game.

We then decided that we would start to write our song together. We learned that Ben (AKA Benasaurus) knew lots about dinosaurs which we thought we could use to our advantage and decided we would write a rap song about dinosaurs and what it would be like if they were in a band.

Over the next few sessions we came up with different verses and chose which chords we wanted to use by hearing different styles and chord progressions on the guitar. We were lucky that in our band already, we had a guitar player, trumpet player, piano player and expert dinosaur impressionist which made it easy to decide which instruments and sounds to use.

In the last three sessions, we recorded ourselves playing the song on our different instruments and our singing and then I mixed and edited it together. After some notes from the band, we had a track we were happy with. However, we felt that every good song deserves to have a music video. So, Maya and Bartosz used their film making skills to film the dinosaur in different situations which was then later edited into our music video!

By Claire Docherty

Here’s the beautiful piece of music that came out of this project. “Not as fierce as they look” 

Seamab Safe

Great to be back at Seamab

Tinderbox have been running music workshops and lessons with children at Seamab School for 3 years. Seamab provides care and education to children from across Scotland who have complex needs. Up to 21 children come to school at Seamab, with up to 15 children in residential placements in 3 bungalows about a mile away from the school.

When I returned to working at Seamab after the pandemic, the pupils were very keen to get back to music making. We have a music “hut” where each child has a space to explore different instruments on their own without the hustle and bustle of classmates and teachers. Everyone has slightly different interests, but the drum kit is always a favourite! It’s always a great moment when the pupils are simply enjoying playing music and becoming more confident in their own ability to create.

Christy Ringrose

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Music For Film at Edinburgh Youth Film Festival

We couldn’t have chosen a more atmospheric morning for our recent Music for Film collaboration with the Edinburgh Youth Theatre. Arriving into the space at St John’s Church on the corner of Prince’s Street we were greeted by friendly staff and stunning sights.

 

The views from each window perfectly set the scene for the creation of the soundtrack to the film ‘Zombified’ which was written by one of their young participants. On one side of the room, we overlooked a misty courtyard with ruined tombstones, and on the other a gothic clocktower – all ideal visual prompts for the immersive, musical experience to follow. Everyone present contributed their ideas to the music and performed together using a variety of Instruments including, Ukulele, Guitar, Percussion and the church’s piano to create the final piece.

 

In just under two hours, Mike led the group in composing, performing and recording the score for the short film. What a brilliant and inspiring morning!

 

Shea Martin

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Tinderbox Collective is a community of young people, musicians, artists and youth workers, based in Scotland.  We are a registered Scottish charity, under the name Tinderbox Project, no. SC042825.


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North Edinburgh Arts Centre
15a Pennywell Road
Edinburgh EH4 4TZ

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