All the way from New Orleans, Soul Rebels Brass Band are currently on tour and on their visit to the UK stopped off at Morpeth School to put on a short concert and run a workshop with the schools’ big band Urban Playground. These guys sure know how to put on a show and the volume they create is immense. Sure enough, the hundred or so pupils who were lucky enough to attend the event gave them an rapturous welcome and got into the party atmosphere as they got up, sang, clapped and danced their way through the band’s short set which included a fantastic cover of Katy Perry’s track ‘California Gurls’.

The workshop for the schools’ big band ‘Urban Playground’ was equally impressive and provided an amazing opportunity for the pupils to get tips and advice from their professional visitors. The band ran through a couple of their numbers including the song ‘I Feel Good’ which later provided the musical backdrop for each pupil to perform a solo as part of the workshop.

It was fantastic and yet another memorable day for the music students at Morpeth School and another major coup for their highly successful Music department. I highly suggest you check out their EP on Spotify by clicking the link below.

Soul Rebels Brass Band are playing Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club on July 20th and the Edinburgh Jazz Festival on July 22nd. For more information visit their website here.

Spotify: Soul Rebels Brass Band – Nothing But Love – EP

Today, I’m going to share with you my favourite piece of classical music of all time. It’s the third movement (Romanza) from Vaughan Williams 5th Symphony.

Vaughan Williams is a terribly unfashionable composer in the eyes of musicologists and academics, especially when he shared a similar period of history to the mind-blowing brilliance of composers such as Stravinsky. There is a wonderful simplicity to his music that seems to strike a chord with me. Having studied various composers of the 20th century for several years and sat through many listening sessions and score reading exercises during my University days, it’s very hard to listen to a piece of music without trying to analyse it. Trying to spot the clever things the composers have done, or explore the conceptual background of the music – and to be honest, it saps the fun out of it.

What I find about Vaughan Williams music is that it you can easily take it at face value. That is not to say, it’s not worthy of academic review or serious consideration of it’s technical ability – I just tend to be able to listen to it without trying to break it down. Which is where we come to the third movement of his fifth symphony. For me, this is the most beautiful piece of classical music I’ve ever heard and I find this hard to admit giving my cold-hearted, unemotional nature. The highlight of this piece for me is the swelling string part about 3 minutes in. It builds and builds until we end up with an ‘Halleluiah’ sounding melody played by the first violins and then by the horns.

The late Vernon Handley's Version is Outstanding

I’ve heard many different recordings of this so I’ll recommend a few for you to listen to. Andre Previn has conducted this one a few times, but I’ve never been a fan of the speed in which he chooses. For the best recordings I suggest Vernon Handley conducting the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic or Andrew Davies conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

So before you go to bed tonight, stick this piece on and just listen to some non-academic, simple brilliance.

Amazon today announced a new service that will soon be available called the ‘Cloud Player’. The idea is that users can upload their music tracks to their own space on the internet and access it from any computer or Android phone. This beats Apple and Google who are apparently developing similar systems themselves. The idea of a large amount of online storage space for general public use isn’t exactly a new idea (i.e. Dropbox), but the fact that the major players see this as the way forward means the demise of the CD and the hard drive. Read more

Earlier this year, my music lesson at Morpeth School was filmed as part of a Musical Futures promotional video. Just noticed that it’s now online! Check it out. My Head of Department says I deserve an Oscar… what do you reckon?

I’ve recently been working on ‘In at the Deep’ end projects with Year 8 students at school. Usually with this type of lesson the kids pick some very awkward choices of songs that are hard for them to learn over several lessons. This is especially so when you have them picking ‘Grime’ tracks that they’re supposed to be able to play on a couple of guitars and a drum kit. Read more