"Out in the field"

I am writing Red Hot song library Christmas songs at the moment. Hearing of composers who went out "into the field" (Bartok etc) to get inspiration for their projects, I decided to sit in a coffee shop among the Christmas shoppers to get some of the Christmas "Buzz" as I (hopefully) wrote lyrics.
The coffee was nice, and I may have wandered into a few sales. I did write one verse, but had to wear Ipod headphones to block out "Jinglebell rock" playing in the background. Perhaps I'll sit in a Stable next.....

Cleo plays trombone!

A few pictures from the rehearsal yesterday for the Christmas shows we are doing at the Stables theatre. Here is Cleo Laine playing the TROMBONE. Cleo asked Mark Nightingale (her trombonist..pictured) if he would sing some backing vocals for her. He said he would only do it if she played trombone!. She has been having secret lessons with my friend Rachel Coles, and they are doing a duet in the Christmas show.... brilliant! not bad for 83!.

Wednesday at Williams

In my "Red Hot duet" books, I dedicated a tune to my sister in law Roz, and some girl friends who meet in the Williams coffee pub in Burlington Ontario Canada. While on my trip to the States and Canada a couple of weeks ago I was able to be a "Willams girl" for the night.... fantastic!!. The girls posed for this photo with "Their piece". Happy Christmas Williams girls!!.

All ready for Cleo's Christmas show!

This year the shows are on Thursday the 15, Friday the 16th and Saturday the 17th of December at 8pm. Tickets are £29.50 or £32 each and the concerts are fundraisers in aid of Wavendon Allmusic Plan Ltd. So come along and have a wonderful time supporting a good cause!Every year Dame Cleo Laine celebrates Christmas at The Stables in her own inimitable way with her special guests. This year's band lineup is as follows: John Horler (piano), Alec Dankworth (bass), Jim Hart (drums), Mark Nightingale (trombone), Andy Panayi (sax), Sarah Watts (sax), Jimmy Hastings (sax), Karen Sharp (sax), Henry Lowther (trumpet), Robbie Robson (trumpet).This year's Special Guest Stars are Jacqui Dankworth, Lorna Dallas, Peter Fisher (violin), Emily Dankworth, Martha Shrimpton, Woburn Sands Brass Band, Pete Churchill and the London Vocal Project.The Woburn Sands Band will be performing in the foyer pre-show to get you into an appropriately festive mood!

Just back from America!

We have just got back from attending the New York state music educators conference where I was presenting. We had a lovely time, and were made to feel very welcome. A session with New York state music teachers.

Denise, Hans and George from JW Pepper. It was lovely to meet them, and I would like to thank them for selling my books.

The Rochester convention centre where the conference took place. A choir warming up .

Sarah Watts brochure

Casually placed on a table ( or two.... or...)

New website!

I am very excited. My publisher kevin Mayhew Ltd have just built me a posh new website! . I am very thrilled with it. have a look !! www.sarah-watts.com

Extreme cups!

The cup song/cup game is quite a topical subject in our house, as I have to say my daughters do it rather well. I found this video on youtube of an Orff teachers workshop. I must say I like the music they chose to "cup" to when they all got going. ( I liked the way they learned the routine using words).

New Trinity exam repertoire books

I have contributed to a new set of exam resource books for Trinity Guildhall. They can be used for the exams, or as stand alone repertoire books. They arrived this morning, and look really good. Other people who were commissioned to write pieces were James Rae, Sally Adams, Karen Street Andy Hampton, , Malcolm Miles, Paul Harris and Mike Mower to name a few. There are also classical graded repertoire pieces. I think they will be very useful.

Day in London

I had a lovely day in London on Friday, first visiting Chloe at Wigmore, and then on to The National Portrait Gallery where Martha was in a play about a Woman playwright. The play was part of a conference about the first women actresses as portrayed in what were then their pin ups, actually beautiful portraits.
I was thrilled to see the above on a building in Wigmore Street. Its always nice to see bassoons represented. I have to say that my first thought on a November morning though, was bet they're cold!

Pentatonic songs

The pentatonic and ostinato song books now have their new covers ready for my trip to the New York State Educators conference. all very exciting really....

Bonfire night

Chloe and I played the Handel Royal Fireworks at Stowe tonight. It was quite stirring, and when we came home and heard a local fireworks display playing canned music I felt pleased that ours was live.

Ring out those bells!!

Was very interested to read the article below about the big peel of bells that will start the olympics. I must confess to being more excited about this than the olympics itself!

A mass bell-ringing will be held to mark the launch of the Olympics as part of the London 2012 Festival, a UK-wide programme of cultural events.
Masterminded by artist Martin Creed, the three-minute nationwide bell-ringing will start at 0800 on 27 July.
Stonehenge, The Giant's Causeway and other iconic heritage sites will be transformed by art installations as part of the 12-week festival.
The arts celebration will cost £52.4m and include 1,000 events.
The full programme of the London 2012 Festival - the culmination of the four-year Cultural Olympiad - was unveiled in central London on Friday.
Music, theatre, dance, visual arts, literature, fashion and film will all be included in the festival that will run concurrently with the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Speaking to the BBC News website on Thursday, Cultural Olympiad chair Tony Hall said the London 2012 Festival would be "the country's biggest ever cultural celebration

Watts hits youtube!

After the horror of seeing myself on these videos ( actually looking unusually respectable...) I think Kevin Mayhew Ltd have done a wonderful job of producing them. there are four altogether. There are two featuring all the "Red Hot Song library" books, and one showing the recorder tutor/method ( above), and one showing the "Red Hot Recorder Songs.

Grand Concerto gastronomique

Martha was playing the part of the waitress in Malcolm Arnolds Grand Concerto Gatronomique as part of the Malcolm Arnold festival at the weekend. I love Arnolds music, and the evening brought back memories of my Dad listening to the Hoffnung concerts on the radio. The review below said it was very "English", and it was! gloriously so!!

Arnold’s non-symphonic orchestral music was understandably little in evidence, though Saturday evening’s concert featured two pieces stemming from his involvement with the Hoffnung Music Festivals. Carnival of Animals (1959) is occasionally revived and should be heard more regularly for the piquancy of its depictions of gawky Giraffes, canonic sheep, cavorting cows, scurrying mice, dextrous elephants and aleatoric bats – interspersed with witty poems from members of Northampton’s Malcolm Arnold Academy, stylishly read by Martha Shrimpton and William Sitwell. The Ealing Symphony was in its collective element here as in Grand Concerto Gastronomique (1961), which appears to have gone unheard for half-a-century: scored for ‘Eater, Waiter, Food and Orchestra’, this 20-minute (and highly English!) precursor of 1960s performance-art was admirably ‘served up’ by Richard Brooman, Shrimpton and an elegantly Schubertian vocalise from Jennifer Smith, yet the musical content proved surprisingly effective on its own terms: a conflation of Arnold off-cuts, to be sure, though one that was not merely apposite to the course at hand but deftly assembled as an extended span of superior library music. Well worth periodic revival and not just at Arnold-centred events such as this

Please "Like my facebook page

Please "like" my facebook page
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Sarah-Watts/171268012950413

I can't believe this!

This was sent to me today!

"Scary Fairground ride!"

There is a great performance of "Scary Fairground Ride" from my "Ostinato song book"

http://www.kevinmayhew.com/red-hot-songs-library-ostinato.html by Warmister Prep school on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvkm33d8uAQ. They have sung the song and then added the ostinatos (with actions!), to make four parts. For young voices this is really quite something. I visited Warmister prep earlier this year to do a workshop day. They have an excellent music dept with every child learning the recorder and benefiting from a a very vibrant syllabus. Very exciting!

EMBARRASSING MOMENT!!!!

I was in the Medici gallery in South kensington a couple of days ago ( one of my favourite shops). While I was in there, there was some music playing, and I instantly listened because it was a song that I had done an arrangement of, and it sounded very like my arrangement. I continued to browse, and the next track came on which was also familiar.. definately one of mine. Intrigued ( and frankly quite excited now), I went to the man at the till, (where there were quite a few people in the queue behind me), and said "Excuse me, can you tell me what CD you are playing?". He Said "We're not playing anything". We both listened.... It was my Ipod on in my bag!.

New pentatonic song book.

I am excited that my pentatonic song book is out now. Twenty NEW pentatonic songs. I hope these will be a welcome resource for those teaching the Orff method. The cover will say "Pentatonic songs" on the next printing. Hang on to the first cover, it may become valuable!!!!
I am probably more excited about the Ostinato song book, as it is ultimately flexible and can be used in so many ways. The songs are written around short four or two bar harmonic patterns, and each comes with a set of ostinatos which can be sung as extra choral parts, or played as instrumental parts. There is also an easy ostinato bass line, and a set of improvising notes. The teacher can make a creative performance of each song using the elements. There are songs in all styles, including a Christmas ostinato song, and ostinato Olympics!

Does anyone remember the North Bucks Music Centre?

So sad the other day to see what has happened to the old pavilion which was the North Bucks music centre. It was there I dreaded my violin lessons, enjoyed my first introduction to wind chamber music, trembled before associated board exams, played my first Beethoven symphony and goofed my scales.... ahh... memories.

A nice day with the Fellers.

A real treat this week, to meet up with Ron and Marsha feller of "Fellers Art Factory"
http://www.fellersartsfactory.com/
We originally met in Spokane when I visited America for the Orff conference last year. Ron and Marsha are performers who tour schools in America making masks and writing plays and songs with the students. Pictured below is Ron with some of the incredible masks he made by sculpting paper. We had a wonderful day catching up and sharing creative ideas.

To make you smile

Ann Dickens

It is with great sadness that I report the death on Monday of Ann Dickens. Ann , along with her husband Ron was one of our Music camp directors. She was a special lady who inspired me greatly. She wrote many music camp shows, and was a genius with words and lyrics. We wrote a "Who dunnit" musical together called "Murder at Mainbrace Manor", and it was a privilege to (almost) see her brain whirring into action as new ideas came. She had energy, drive, and the creativity of ten people. All this, made for some of the most exciting and vibrant music camps I can remember.

Watts with the jazz bassoon?

When I was in my early twenties (not that long ago!!) I made two recordings of Jazz bassoon (now fortunately unavailable). Mike Hatchard wrote a lovely Jazz suite for me, and I jazzed to standards like the rest.

Meeting some American friends today, they introduced Chloe and I to Bela Fleck and the flecktones. This is worth a watch on youtube. have to say the bassoon does sound a bit like a muted trumpet at times, but he knows his way around the instrument... very impressive, as its hard to play jazz on the bassoon. I think my jazz was a bit more genteel!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6v6j_JbOlpA&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PL6A84144EA26090CE

Week of insets.

A really great day today doing four workshops with 130 teachers in Northants. This is the third lot of inset workshops I have done this week. A great day with Derbyshire teachers on Monday, a session at Stowe yesterday, and onto surrey for the next one. Really enjoyable.

Foray into Facebook!

I have made a facebook page to share my writing with friends, people who find my books useful and anyone that is just interested.

If you are feeling kind, please will go pay a visit and click on "like"

http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Sarah-Watts/171268012950413

Thank you!

Elgar woz ere.

We have just come back from the lovely Isle of Wight, and I was thrilled to see this blue plaque on a house in Ventnor. Then I thought, I wonder how many days Elgar spent there on his honeymoon... a few?. Then I thought, that if there were blue plaques on all the places that Elgar spent a few days, the country would be full of blue plaques. (sorry, couldn't think of anything intelligent to write about this).

Great performance !

I saw this on youtube, and thought it was really good, and exactly as I had intended it. There are occasionally performances like this, but often the player ( or teacher) doesn't notice ( or doesn't understand) the "Jazz quaver" instruction at the top of the music. Many composers write jazzy pieces with dotted rhythms, and I just cant bring myself to do that.... for a start its not how they should be played. So, well done boy in the green jumper, you are very cool.

Camera trauma!!

I had a good, but traumatic day on Monday. I filmed some YouTube videos to introduce and explain some of my books. It was all done in front of a green screen, so I may have books whizzing behind me! ( They have promised not to put me on a airport runway!). I am a bit worried about seeing the finished result, as I find looking at myself in a mirror bad enough.

To cap it all, I had new photos taken for brochures etc. (aughhhh!). in front of a white screen this time... . Quite an adventure, but good job I'm not a newsreader or something....For someone who hates having their photo taken, it was like having shock therapy.