Daytime Voices

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMondays are Music for Everyone’s weekly emails designed to keep you up to date with MfE events & to circulate interesting finds, special features, and motivational moments for your Mondays! We are aiming to send out something new each week.

#MfEMonday – 21st November 2022

21st November 2022 Music for Everyone

Congratulations to all those Daytime Voices singers who took part in end of term performances last week. Not only did you raise the roof, but various cake sales also raised a very impressive £460 for their associated Open Voices groups! Click here to hear West Bridgford Daytime Voices absolutely rocking ‘Like an Eagle’. A special mention must also go to the newly formed Hucknall Daytime Voices group who were invited to perform at the Jon Godber Centre’s Christmas fair last Sunday – you were brilliant!

Coming up – Daytime Orchestra Loughborough will be performing at All Saints Church Loughborough on Tuesday 06 December at 11:30 as part of their Christmas Tree Festival. The concert is free and they will finish with a carol singalong! Please come along, it will be a wonderful way to kick off a month of festivities.

We are busy putting together the music and information packs for Blow the Dust and are particularly looking forward to hearing the orchestra perform the overture to Dr Miracle by Bizet. In typical operatic fashion, Dr Miracle is a bizarre story about how forbidden love is overcome with the use of a poisoned omelette! There is even an entire quartet dedicated to the serving of the omelette.

Don’t miss out on your opportunity to pay homage to the humble omelette – there are still places available on Blow the Dust, click here for more information and here to sign up. And don’t forget to tell your friends!

On Saturday 26 November, Bingham and District Choral Society will be joining forces with Mansfield Choral Society and the Nottingham Symphony Orchestra to celebrate their 50^th Jubilee with a Last Night of the Proms concert at Southwell Minster. Why not join them to celebrate this Golden Jubilee milestone? Full details attached or on their website here.

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

21/11/2022

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/blow-the-dust-off-your-instrument-3/

#MfEMonday – 24th October 2022

24th October 2022 Music for Everyone

November is just around the corner, that must mean that MfE Christmas and 2023 events are now open for booking!

Concerts

Nottingham Chamber Singers present A Mystical Christmas at 3.30pm on Sunday 4^th December at St Mary the Virgin Church in Bunny.

Christmas is Coming! On Sunday 11^th December, members of the MfE ‘singing family’ come together for MfE’s annual Christmas concert at the Albert Hall, Nottingham, featuring a special appearance from Father Christmas! Children tickets are just £5 each.

Further details and ticket booking link for concerts can be found here: https://www.music-for-everyone.org/whats-on/concerts/

Workshops/Courses

Christmas Vocals – open to all primary aged singers, a singing afternoon on Saturday 10^th December, then join the Christmas is Coming concert to perform on Sunday 11^th December! https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/vocals-christmas-is-coming/

Nottingham Community Voices – Christmas. Members of Daytime Voices and Community Voices are invited to join Vocals on Sunday 11^th December at the Albert Hall, Nottingham for MfE’s annual Christmas concert. Optional rehearsals from 28^th November, https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/christmas-is-coming-daytime-voices/

Blow the Dust off your Instrument Saturday 7^th January 2023

Nottingham Festival Chorus workshop weekend and concert 28/29 January & 4 February 2023

https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/nfc-course-weekend/

The Nottingham Festival Chorus will be celebrating the 150^th anniversary of Ralph Vaughan Williams in their next event, a singing weekend course and concert in January/February 2023, performing the stunning work Toward the Unknown Region.

The anniversary itself is being commemorated and celebrated throughout 2022 (our celebration comes a little later than the actual anniversary!) with October being the anniversary of his birth.

A champion of music-making in the community, he was a central figure to British musical life. His work The Lark Ascending is regularly voted the UK’s favourite classical work, and he was well known for writing for most major forms of genre in music, including film and stage.

Have a listen to brighten a rainy Monday to The Lark Ascending: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZR2JlDnT2l8

Bake Off fever has hit the office again, we’ve been enjoying some musical puns linked to baking – this one in particular made us giggle!

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

24/10/2022

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMonday – 11th July 2022

11th July 2022 Music for Everyone

Last week saw the end of term for MfE’s Daytime Groups, with concerts from all the Daytime Voices choirs and orchestras – see some of the groups in action below!

On Saturday, the Nottingham Chamber Singers held their ‘Words & Music’ concert in St Mary’s Church in Clifton Village – a fantastic performance for a summers evening and enjoyed by all!

Well done to all our groups for their hard work this term – looking forward to returning to the music making in September!

To fit with the hot weather we are currently enjoying – a Desert Island Discs special!

Let’s start with the theme tune, a desert island disc in its own right. ‘By the Sleepy Lagoon’ composed by Eric Coates has introduced the BBC Radio series Desert Island Discs since 1942 and is still used today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMMS4I6f7o4

Some of the most requested composers on Desert Island Discs include Beethoven and Elgar. Take a listen to these tunes and let the hot weather fool you into believing you’re sat on a desert island… What would you choose to take with you?

Elgar – Enigma Variations ‘Nimrod’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8NOVGHJmRs

Conducted by Leonard Bernstein and performed by BBC Symphony Orchestra in 1982.

Beethoven – Symphony No.6 ‘Pastoral’ 1^st movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zKiDXbwdR0

Performed by the Berliner Philharmoniker.

If you enjoyed this, why not listen to our Open Voices leader, Cliff McArdle, choose his own Desert Island Discs with the U3A Beeston via Zoom on Wednesday evening, 6.30pm – link to join below.

Join Zoom Meeting (Wednesday from 6.30pm)
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81037019352?pwd=eElwNTNrVFNIeUJtQStsWEtYcVZpQT09

Meeting ID: 810 3701 9352
Passcode: 068509

Amazon DOUBLE DONATIONS Prime Day alert!
If you shop Amazon Prime Day deals on 12 & 13 July, Amazon will double donations: Simply shop with AmazonSmile ON in the Amazon Shopping app or at smile.amazon.co.uk/ch/1153412-0, and AmazonSmile donates to Music For Everyone.

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

11/07/2022

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMonday – 25th April 2022

25th April 2022 Music for Everyone

Greetings after yet another wonderful weekend of MfE music-making!

Saturday and Sunday saw the massed forces of the Nottingham Community Voices (featuring singers from our various daytime voices groups plus members from the Lunchtime Voices, Nottingham Chamber Singers and various other community choirs around the county), combining in a truly stunning ‘chorus line’ for our West End to Broadway musicals course.

Our singers worked hard on their renditions of the romantic and sumptuous scores of My Fair Lady and The King and I, along with smooth and sensual excerpts by the legendary Irving Berlin, before rounding it all off with their riotous rabble of revolutionaries in Les Miserables! They were accompanied by the stunning Nottingham Concert Orchestra, who serenaded us with a string of Broadway hits, including a heart-rending suite from Bernstein’s West Side Story. It was an absolute treat. Adding a little extra shimmer and sparkle to all of this, were the fantastic talents of Simon Theobald and Kate Taylor, whose performances left us simultaneously rolling in the aisles and weeping into our programmes. It was a triumph – huge congratulations to everyone involved!

Our Vocals weekend is next. With expert tuition from Alison Bennett and Rachel Parkes, this is an absolute steal at only £15.00 for the entire event (two workshop afternoons and a concert afternoon). Please tell all the young people (of primary school age) in your lives that it will be a wonderful chance to learn some new and entertaining music, as well as some well-known Disney tunes from Moana. These massed musical events tend to be formative in our experiences and memories, so help us to spread the word. We know you will want to come and support them in their concert on Saturday 21^st May – tickets are available on our website.

Finally for those instrumentalists amongst you, our Summer Blow the Dust day is fast approaching. Tell your friends, or even bring someone along from out of town … it’s a wonderful day to relax, enjoy and bond with other like-minded orchestral players out there! If you fancy an extended chance to waggle those clarinet keys or refine your ‘ricochet’, then our Summer School is for you. More details available at www.music-for-everyone.org

With the sun shining, our minds at MfE are turning to our Summer School. We are really looking forward to returning to Trent College and hopefully enjoying their lovely grounds in the sunshine. If you haven’t yet decided whether to come along, let us motivate you with a few facts about Vaughan William’s, who’s music we will be exploring to mark the 150^th anniversary of his birth:

He was well connected; His great-uncle was Charles Darwin, and ceramics magnate Josiah Wedgewood was his great-great-grandfather.
During the Second World War, he is rumoured to have done a stint of cleaning at the local public toilets in Dorking.
The composer never took his privileged background for granted and worked all his life for democratic and egalitarian ideals. He viewed music as being part of everyone’s everyday life, rather than being the preserve of an elite. Something we wholeheartedly agree with at MfE!

As the French Presidential Elections closed yesterday, we found it fitting that the French national anthem was composed on this day in 1792, here is Berlioz’s arrangement ‘La Marseillaise’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZWabwLPUXc

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

25/04/2022

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMonday – 14th March 2022

14th March 2022 Music for Everyone

MfE Review of 2020-21
Yesterday the MfE AGM took place via Zoom. The meeting ended with an entertaining review of the MfE Year 2020-21 on our YouTube channel. If you would like to watch it then please, just click here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mCtQsBBvDA

It’s an enjoyable watch – get the popcorn out!

This coming Saturday afternoon, 19^th March, MfE’s three youth bands have their Easter concert – Bandtastic! – at West Bridgford Methodist Church. For an afternoon of great windband music, find out more on our website! Tickets will be available on the door: https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/youth-bandtastic/

Musicals course (Saturday 23 April) and concert (Sunday 24^th April).
We are in the process of sorting out all the music for our Musicals course. If you haven’t signed up and would like to come along and sing some of the best music from well-known Musicals then it’s not too late! Just visit our website https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/ncm-come-and-sing/ download the attached form or give our office a ring on 0115 958 9312 – we would love to see you there.

The 75^th BAFTAs took place yesterday, celebrating the best in film from the past year.

Amongst the winners were several musical films, including brand new music and the remake of a classic!

You may well have heard of new animated film Encanto (almost definitely if you have children and grandchildren!) This gets a mention regularly in our office, here’s a catchy song from the film to keep your Monday afternoon going: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQwVKr8rCYw

Another big winner of the night was a story we all know well… the remake of West Side Story has received high praise and brings back those classic songs, including this one that needs no introduction! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoQEddtFN3Q

Did anyone else see the chihuahua performing a routine from Swan Lake at this year’s Crufts? (Yes, it really did happen…) They entered the ‘Heelwork to Music’ category, see a snippet here https://www.classicfm.com/composers/tchaikovsky/chihuahua-swan-lake-crufts/?fbclid=IwAR1QDWnj8bmHjF61j1vmnxeSwwPlgKWBbYkXkrkBek14fV_vDNeC6l_6-94

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

14/03/2022

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMonday – 24th January 2022

24th January 2022 Music for Everyone

This week saw all of our regularly rehearsing groups spring back into action! Four Daytime Voices choirs, two Daytime Orchestras, three Open Voices groups, one Flute Choir, one Swing Band, one Lunchtime Voices choir, one Chamber Choir, two Youth String groups and three Youth Wind bands! That’s approximately 500 people in one week. And all of them delighted to be back making music together.

Perhaps you weren’t aware of the wide variety of groups that MFE run on a regular basis. Do have a look at our website www.music-for-everyone.org to see information about all these groups and the upcoming youth and adult events.

In last week’s MFE Mondays we mentioned the Nottingham Festival Chorus workshop on Saturday 5th February. At the end of the workshop there will be free concert starting at 4:30 featuring music by Mendelssohn, Handel, Haydn and Faure. If you would like to attend, please order your pass by following this link https://www.music-for-everyone.org/nfc-concert-passes/

Many of us make New Year’s resolutions and often fail to continue them beyond the end of January! However, some people choose to make a musical New Year’s resolution. Here are a few examples –

“My goal in 2022 is to dedicate myself to practicing regularly for my weekly keyboard class so I can expand my musical horizons!” Project Manager

“My 2022 New Year’s resolution is to sing better even if it’s only the car or the shower.” Designer

“My music resolution is to play my trumpet regularly again. It’s just sitting in the case right now collecting dust. Thus year I’m going to get it back out and play more often!” Office administrator

“I don’t play any instruments, but I’m an avid music listener. My goal is to find a new artist to listen to every month this year.” Web developer

What will your musical resolution be this year? Do let us know.

Why not start the year off by testing your musical knowledge? This online quiz is great fun but might have you scratching your head on some of the questions – http://classicaltest.net/ Congratulations if you manage 100%!

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

24/01/2022

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMonday – 13th December 2021

13th December 2021 Music for Everyone

Congratulations to all who took part in yesterday’s Christmas is Coming concert at the Albert Hall! Everyone had a great time – even Father Christmas was impressed!

*BOOKWISE* Our bookshop in Nottingham (10 Goose Gate, Hockley) is open through December for all your book-buying-last-minute-present-shopping needs, including SUNDAYS! For December only, the shop will be open on Sundays from 11am – 3pm in addition to the usual opening hours (Tuesday – Saturday, 11am – 4pm)

Did you know that today is Saint Lucy’s Day? Also called the Feast of Saint Lucy, it commemorates Lucia of Syracuse who according to legend brought food and aid to Christians hiding in the Roman catacombs, wearing a candle lit wreath on her head (do not try this at home) to light her way and leave her hands free to carry as much food as possible.

Her feast day, which coincided with the shortest day of the year prior to calendar reforms, is widely celebrated as a festival of light. Falling within the Advent season, Saint Lucy’s Day is viewed as a precursor of Christmastide, pointing to the arrival of the Light of Christ in the calendar on Christmas Day.

Here are some truly awful Christmas jokes to get you in the mood for those Christmas crackers! Enjoy….

What is the Three Wise Men’s favourite Christmas Carol?
Oh Camel, ye Faithful.

What is a snowman’s favourite song?
Freeze a jolly good fellow.

Why did the choir have to cancel their carol concert?
They caught Tinselitis.

What’s the best present a musician could ever receive?
A broken drum. You can’t beat it.

What do Baroque musicians do if they don’t like their Christmas presents?
Hand them Bach.

Why are sopranos so good at Christmas shopping?
They always manage to get descant prices.

What is a duck’s favourite Christmas Carol?
In the Beak Midwinter

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

13/12/2021

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMonday – Keeping in Touch

14th June 2021 Music for Everyone

KEEPING IN TOUCH

Hello everyone,

Today was meant to be the day we would all hear that Step 4, the final unlocking was going to take place, as scheduled, on Monday 21^st June. But as we now all know – that isn’t going to take place.

So where does that leave us as far as everything we have planned for the remainder of this season?

At the moment, this is how things stand:

Tuesday 14^th June – Daytime Voices rehearsal at the Albert Hall. This has been cancelled.
Saturday 19^th June 1.30 – 5.30pm – Youth Windband Workshop afternoon at the Albert Hall. Still going ahead and places available. Visit here to sign up https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/youth-wind-band-workshop
Sunday 20^th June 1.30 – 5.30pm – Youth String Workshop afternoon at the Albert Hall. Still going ahead and places available. Visit here to sign up https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/youth-string-workshop
Sunday 27^th June 10am – 5pm – Adult Singing Workshop at the Albert Hall. ‘Let all the world in every corner Sing!’ We are awaiting guidance from Making Music, the national organisation which represents amateur music making societies, to see if this can still go ahead. More information to follow very soon.
Saturday 10^th July 10am – 5.30pm – Adult Playing Workshop at the Albert Hall. ‘Blow the dust off your Instrument’. Still going ahead and places available. Visit here to sign up https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/blow-the-dust-off-your-instrument-3
Saturday 17^th July 1.30 – 4.30pm – Family Sing Workshop afternoon at the Albert Hall. We are awaiting guidance from Making Music to see if this can still go ahead. More information to follow very soon.
Monday 9^th – Wednesday 11^th August – MfE Summer School at Trent College. We are keeping our fingers crossed that all restriction will have been lifted by August – so – still going ahead and places available. Visit here to sign up https://www.music-for-everyone.org/event/summer-school-2021

We hope things will be clearer by next week – in the meantime, we try and stay optimistic and positive!

Have a good week.

With all best wishes

Angela

Watch this video for a giggle… string players getting competitive! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKezUd_xw20

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

14/06/2021

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF

#MfEMondays – Keeping in Touch

24th May 2021 Music for Everyone

KEEPING IN TOUCH

Hello everyone,

Well what a week of frustration and disappointment!

There we all were, along with thousands of other singers throughout the country, looking forward so much to joining together and having a SING!!

But – as I’m sure you are now all aware – the government made a screeching u-turn round about 5pm last Tuesday regarding choir rehearsals and singing was proclaimed DANGEROUS!! Professional choirs are able to sing together but only 6 amateur singers are allowed to sing under one roof!!

This meant that one of our choir rehearsals on Wednesday evening could not go ahead as planned and our Family Singing Afternoon at the Albert Hall, which was going to be a wonderful event with almost 100 singers from across the generations enjoying themselves together, was scuppered and has had to be rescheduled for later in the year (17^th July). And it looks as though our Daytime Voices rehearsal scheduled for Wednesday of this week will have to be cancelled. We’ll be in touch with singers round about lunchtime tomorrow to let you know what’s happening.

So we’ve hit the media to express our feelings!

Our chairman, John Hess gave an excellent interview on East Midlands Today. https://youtu.be/PZ2ljbf25sM

Robin Reece-Crawford returned to Radio Nottingham on Sunday morning to chat once again to Francis Finn https://youtu.be/SuuhmykKVww

And the Evening Post ran an article about the whole situation. On line on Thursday https://www.nottinghampost.com/news/nottingham-news/charity-singing-group-disappointed-latest-5439430 and in the newspaper on Saturday.

So what can you do?

Write to your MP – John wrote to his and she raised it with the Prime Minister at the meeting of the 1922 Committee of Conservative MPs.
Sign this on-line petition – very easy to do and it will make a difference. Let’s see if we can make Nottingham and the surrounding areas bright red on the petition map. https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/586559
Make representation to anyone you know in high places.
Hope that the government sees sense!!

We’ll keep you up-dated with any developments.

Keep cheerful!

Angela

PS The subject was raised on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning – perhaps waves are being created.

MUSICAL FLASH MOB PART 4. The Royal College of Music Philharmonic surprised visitors of the Science Museum with highlights from Holst’s Planets Suite. Proof that music and science can go together! Watch the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrcXt-f-M6c
This is the last video in our month of flash mobs. Vote for your favourite video from May here: https://www.music-for-everyone.org/favourite-flash-mob/

Have a good week!

Your friends at MfE.

24/05/2021

www.music-for-everyone.org | 0115 9589312

10 Goose Gate | Hockley | NG1 1FF