RCM Festival of Percussion featuring Stewart July 8, 2012

[English-lion]

Enjoy you Bastards!!!

[Phil9]

Not long now and realy looking forward to this event, Im at risk of redunancy over the next couple of weeks and this event will help take my mind it.

[smax]

^ that sucks, man.

looking forward to this bad boy, tho. lots.

[conroy]

Looking forward to the reports (clandestine recordings???!!!)

Hope a bit of the nutter karma rubs off on you, Phil.

[smudge]

[quote="Phil9"]Tickets bought £25 for both my son and me, bargin! cost more for train fare.[/quote]

Phil9 - we've been hopelessly disorganised. Just yell 'Smudge', 'Smax', 'Dafttart', or o'Peanut' any time after noon if you and your son want to meet up with fellow enthusiasts. Alternatively call

[iain28]

Sorry London clan ..Ali and me cant make it ...Reports and pics ..have a good one

[dafttart]

On my way in to the RCM. Very excited to be seeing Smudge and Smax and also to meet Peanut and Phil for the first time. Oh yeah and to see an Audience with Mr C! Will report back later, hopefully with many indiscretions

Iain and Ali, we will raise a glass to you and all other absent Nutters, natch!

[DirtyMartini]

Have a wonderful time, everyone!

Hoping for the best for you, Phil9.

[dafttart]

Brilliant day at the Royal College of Music with old friends and new. 

Sat with Kate and Smax during a class about Indian and Middle Eastern drum techniques where we found ourselves reciting strange syllable sounds and clapping to bizarre rhythms. Odd but wonderful. And strangely sexy to boot!

An Audience with Stewart Copeland was Mr C being Mr C. He was loud, funny, verbose, passionate and very complementary about Sting! I learnt about the 'shit cord' and am now ready to write my debut film score!

6.30pm saw us in a small auditorium to see SC and the RCM Big Band perform Orchestralli. But not before the college principal had spent 15 minutes drawing tickets for a raffle!! The wait was worth it and I was absolutely blown away by the music. The students were amazing and the conductor must've been on speed, or at least ProPlus! 

It was a bonus to meet Peanut, Phil9 and his lovely son (now the proud owner of 2 well used drumsticks) and Jayne, who really needs to be on this forum!

I know that others will write proper reviews so I leave it at that. Just to say, a FAB day

[ladyhawke]

daftart this sound like a wonderful time and cant wait to hear other stories to. glad you could all go i hope to hear more stories. thank you for sharing

[English-lion]

Good to hear you had a great time ..... bet you can't get to sleep now ;-)

[Phil9]

Just a quick post to say what a fantastic time in London and it was nice to meet everyone.
Hung about after the show and managed to get a couple of pics of Stew, my Son and me taken by Stewarts Daughter.
What a brilliant day made good by being with other SC fans!

[Maud138]

Oh! Can you show us the photo Phil9? We would love to see it. Did you chat with Stewart?
I'm glad you all had a great time. It wish I could have been there with the nutters!
In two weeks it is my turn when I come to London for the Clarke-Copeland show with Smudge!!!

[ladyhawke]

phll9 this sounds real fun and like every one has a good time cant wait to see all the pics and more of these stories

[smudge]

A major highlight of the day was that we all managed to meet up. We were a bit last minute organising that: some sort of banner/flag would have come in handy. It would have been a good day for someone flying solo, but waaaaay better to share it with fellow enthusiasts. Meeting Peanut, phil9 and son, and Jayne for the first time, and hanging out with them, Smax, and Dafttart was great. (As Dafttart has pointed out, Jayne's not on here yet). Particular props to phil9's son who coped admirably with a posse of excitable middle aged folk, AND snagged a pair of genuine Copeland-battered drumsticks. Brilliant that you two got a photo.

Downside? It was pretty sparsely attended: the Royal College of Music Drumline, and the Big Band deserved a bigger audience. It was £15 for an entire day of interesting stuff. If it happens next year, do go.

Non-Copeland highlight (the most fascinating bit of the day for me): Pete Lockett's workshop on South Indian rhythm. Smax and I opted for this over a masterclass on the use of timpani in 'The Rite of Spring' (honestly, as a non-musician I was SERIOUSLY out of my depth at this event). Dafttart mentioned it in her review. In 50 minutes this guy got my thick head, schooled in 4/4, 3/4, 2/4, or 7/8 on an adventurous day, around a completely different way of thinking about rhythm/time signatures. Something I knew absolutely nothing about, and I now know pretty much nothing about but am gripped by. http://www.petelockett.com/

So, Copeland stuff:

1. Q&A

A lot of focus on the process of scoring for film/TV. We got a (verbal, arm-wavey) breakdown of a scene from The Equalizer, and how the audience's perception of what was going on would rest with when in the scene the 'there's some shit going down' chord was played. Also, useful advice on the hierarchy of sound in the editing process "We're all competing for a finite number of iron-oxide particles on the tape." (Dialogue trumps sound effects, and both trump music. Kinda like rock/paper/scissors except one of them always loses.) Oh, and the 'dogs' pitch advice

Discussion of the industry - how it's changed, and the difference between being a professional musician in an orchestra versus a 'band'. Mr Copeland was very complimentary about the students he had been rehearsing with.

2. RCM Big Band & Copeland

We snuck into the sound check/last minute rehearsal. Man, I would not want to be the sound dude. How do you make a handful of violins audible over all that 'clattering and banging'? Well, you really can't - at least not to my slightly dodgy ears. However, when the 'clattering and banging' is Mr Copeland and some very fine young percussionists it doesn't matter overmuch to this audience. I adore the Orchestralli pieces. (Maud, we learned from our Eindhoven experience and sat quite a way back from the stage!)

Quip of the evening award goes to the Maestro. He had to pause between pieces to conduct some running repairs on the kit (no Jeff in a hard hat). As he wielded implements someone called out "You just can't get the roadies these days". "This," quoth Mr Copeland, "is Fine Art. We don't have roadies."

On to Ronnie Scott's!