Music in Society

Celtic Connections, founded by Colin Hynd to fill the post- Christmas gap in the Glasgow Royal
Concert hall, started in 1994, and is held every January. It has grown since then to become one of
the biggest annual winter events of its kind in the UK. It is without a doubt one of the greatest forces
for promoting Scottish culture and music in Scotland, the UK and further abroad.
There are hundreds of concerts, ceilidhs, workshops, free events and talks every year and they have
featured many great artists like Clannad and Sinad OConnor. Celtic Connections plays a large role
in cultural and musical education with its Education Programme. The Programme gives children a
greater insight into cultural heritage with workshops, concerts and tutorials. Since 1999 over 200,
000 children from all over Scotland have taken advantage of this programme. Throughout schools in
Scotland they run taster workshops given by actual professional musicians introducing a wide berth
of Scottish music and traditional expression through Scots song, storytelling, Scots and Irish
stepdance and instrumental tuition in instruments like the tin whistle, fiddle, bodhran and clarsach.
The festival play a large role in society with these workshops by making them free of charge meaning
they are open to anyone who wishes to learn.
Celtic Connections also runs lots of informal, public workshops throughout the year, many of
which are come and try workshops in a wide variety of instruments like Ukulele and Djembe,
meaning it is open to the public regardless of your skill level on the instrument or even whether you
have played it before.
The second organisation that I wish to discuss and which I feel has a large social impact is
Live Music Now, or LMN for short. LMN have several charities connected across the world. The first
one was formed in the UK in 1977 by the violinist Yehudi Menuhin, along with his friend Ian
Stouztker. LMN has reached over two million people through more than 500,000 workshops and
interactive performances. It also has famous spokesperson such as Julian Lloyd Webber, principal of
Birmingham Conservatoire. LMN looks for young, professional musicians who have that combination
of high performance skills with insight, generosity of spirit, and flexibility. LMN about-us
section
LMN tailors themselves to bringing music to participants who are challenged by disability,
illness, poverty or social disadvantage. The whole mantra of the organisation is to bring music to a
greater number of people, and having a greater beneficial impact on the communities they affect
through continuous involvement. One example of one of their workshops is their Musicians in
Residence program, the aspect I wish to discuss is their workshops from September to December
2014 in a school in Wrexham, Whales. The project involved working with pupils with a range of
special educational needs, including physical, sensory and medical needs as well as difficulties with
language and communication. The school had performances by The Absentees and Project Jam
Sandwich, which gave pupils, many of whom who had never experienced live music; such an
amazing experience. Then 70 pupils took part in a series of small workshops with LMN percussionist
Rhys Matthews. The project was extremely successful and every child involved in the sessions had
an extremely positive response to the music, who were often unresponsive to other projects, for

them, it was life changing. In my opinion this solidifies just one of the ways LMN and music affects
our society for the good.
Sound and Music is a national charity, established on the 1 October 2008, coming from the
merger of four existing bodies, the Society for the Promotion of New Music, the British Music
Information Centre, the Contemporary Music Network and the Sonic Arts Network. They support the
development of artists and composers, works in partnership with a wide array of organisations,
audience development, touring, information and advice, building networks and education. The
forefront goal of the organisation is the support of new music and especially British composers and
artists, promoting them to be at the heart of cultural life and enjoyed by many. Sound and music
website about section.
They work in a wide variety of ways, hosting formals workshops for selected young
composers, as well as reaching out to provide all school children with the opportunity to listen to
new and creative music.
One such project is Minute Listening, the idea behind this exciting and innovative project is
its potential to provide all primary school children with the opportunity to experience sixty seconds
of creative listening each day of the school year. It enables for imaginative class discussion, reflection
and opinion forming, encouraging children to verbally explore what they hear, and supporting
speaking and listening. A major pilot was launched in 2012 involving over seventy primary schools
and the UK in Cornwall, Oxfordshire, Norfolk and London. Astoundingly, almost 20,000 children and
their teachers took part in this through the Spring term. Teachers very simply downloaded a piece of
software that will give them a wealth of sonic resources in the classrooms, this is very important as it
provides nearly everyone with the opportunity to experience this potentially life changing
experience. The project has been quoted by participants as such
It really brought them out of their shell/ MOL has broadened the childrens experience of sound
and music. Primary Teachers involved in the Minute of Listening Pilot.
In todays society we are aware more than ever of the powerful impact that music can have
on a daily persons life, how it can be life changing for many and an educational and rewarding
experience for people in all aspects of society, regardless of aspects of life like socio-economic class
or disability to name a few. It was from my lectures, listening to the speakers, that I gained this
awareness that as musicians we have come to realise that we are no longer simply just musicians,
most of us will be/are required to fill a number of roles and overcome numerous personal challenges
in their professional lives; for example when collaborating with other musicians or dancers, artists or
when working in education, with people with additional learning needs or those from a wide variety
of backgrounds.
One example of a project that brought up lots of challenges was the project Coorrie Doon,
from Enterprise Music Scotland. This project had many emotional challenges as well as practical
ones. The project involved mothers who were expecting children and/or those who had young
children, who came in and composed songs for their children. This was very emotionally challenging,
with people coming from different backgrounds. The very nature of the material; being very
personal, required a lot of emotional sensitivity on the part of the musicians when working with the
mothers and the very personal lyrics and music they had come up with. A practical challenge the
musicians running the project had to overcome was that everyone their had a wide variety of
musical backgrounds, some being more experienced than others, and some having little to no
experience. In a project like this it is clearly shown that communication is an extremely important

skill that is crucial for the musician in todays society. This requires a lot of personal awareness on
the part of the musician as they have to be able to explain complex musical terminology in an easy
to understand way, helping them with composition and song writing, and having patience with those
who are less experienced and work with them so they get the most out of the project.
Another project and charity from one of our lectures that presented a wide array of
challenges was Drake Music. The role of Drake music in society is providing music for people with
different disabilities. The goal of Drake music is contributing so that Scotland has one of the most
inclusive educational systems for music in the world. An organisation like Drake music presents
many challenges for the music and those involved in the project, one such challenge would be
finding new ways to enable someone with a disability to play music, who ordinarily, would not be
able to play. This requires a lot of different skills on the part of the musician as they must
brainstorm, communicate, and think outside of the box to enable those with disabilities the
opportunity to create music. The way in which Drake music overcame this was by coming up with
new technology, like the Skoog, a device which responds to touch, pressure and handling to allow
musicians a high degree of sensitivity and expression. This requires collaboration and
communication, two crucial roles that a musician has to be able to fulfil in todays society, with
designers and the company Skoogmusic, who created the device.
Their project Technophonia, which also collaborated with the composer Oliver Searle and
the City of Edinburgh Music School, which brought together the cutting edge technology of Drake
Music and a wide array of musicians from the City of Edinburgh Music School, and three musicians
playing music technology instruments. This display a unique challenge for the musicians taking part
as it was very personal and emotional, and required a lot from them in terms of hard work, and also
emotionally as well as it gave those with disability a life changing experience of playing music in a
project like this. It also required different aspects from the musicians like patience and
communication in trying to put across different ideas and making everything come together.
I feel now after these lectures more than ever a solidified sense of the musicians role in
society; how important it is that we are prepared to be flexible and work in a wide array of situations
and projects. I have seen how simply being a good musician is not adequate in todays society and
that we must display good communication, willingness to collaborate, patience and being able to
work with others who may not have had any previous musical experience. It is clear that we play a
crucial role in society, in affecting peoples lives in extremely powerful ways, in a unique way that
only music can.

REFERENCES

Celtic Connections
http://www.celticconnections.com/about/Pages/default.aspx 15/11/15
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Connections 15/11/15
http://www.celticconnections.com/Pages/Education-Programme.aspx 15/11/15

http://www.celticconnections.com/events/Pages/event.aspx?ev=1cdba38e-90c1-4bc9-b45fa5310144cfa4 15/11/15
http://www.celticconnections.com/events/Pages/event.aspx?ev=370a5d1c-7cae-4284-94d0a5310144cee0 15/11/15

LMN
http://www.livemusicnow.org.uk/ 15/11/15
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Music_Now 15/11/15
http://www.livemusicnow.org.uk/about-us 15/11/15
http://www.livemusicnow.org.uk/lmn_news/item/68757/date/2014-0922/title/julian_lloyd_webber_joins_live_music_now 15/11/15
http://www.livemusicnow.org.uk/case_studies/item/68833/date/2014-1221/title/using_percussion_to_support_the_musical_and_personal_development_of_a_visually_imp
aired_pupil 15/11/15

Sound and Music

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_and_Music 16/11/15
http://www.soundandmusic.org/knowledge-hub/about 16/11/15
http://www.soundandmusic.org/projects/minute-listening 16/11/15

Enterprise Music Scotland

Coorie Doon
http://www.enterprisemusicscotland.com/learning/coorie-doon/ 19/11/15
https://vimeo.com/138102920 19/11/15

Drake Music
http://www.drakemusicscotland.org/ 19/11/15
http://www.drakemusicscotland.org/what-we-do/technology/ 19/11/15
http://www.drakemusicscotland.org/what-we-do/spotlight/newmusic20x12/ 19/11/15