David Shingler's Stream of Consciousness

I was hoping to get this written down a little sooner but life happened. To be fair, I was hoping to blog more often this year too but once again, life happened!

As some of you will know, I have been studying part time for the last few years. I had the urge to get back into education, something that I turned my back on a long time ago, so jumped in feet first to part time study without having an actual plan. It was a case of do it now or you won’t do it at all.

At the start of my studies I knew that I would have to complete a week long residential in London and to be honest, I was never sure how I actually felt about that. Distance learning is great and so far has suited me down to the ground, but it is hard to feel like a group, especially comparing it to my days at Staffs Uni where strangers became friends and friends became family. There were always Facebook groups and tutorial forums but it just isn’t the same. What did start to help was being added to a WhatsApp group (thanks Mike) consisting of people from my tutor groups from over the years and other students that I had spoken to on Facebook. There were no bell ends in the group and I got to the point where I was really excited to meet this new social circle in the flesh.

We were located in the heart of the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, London. The place is absolutely gorgeous and I feel so blessed to have been able to study there, even for such a short period of time. If you have the opportunity to visit, I would highly recommend it. Our week consisted of seminars, workshops, choir and ensemble work. The days were long, intense and very tiring and it all culminated in a sharing performance at Blackheath Halls on Saturday night.

Some people were dreading choir and I get that. If singing isn’t your thing, being exposed to your peers and the public can be terrifying! I wasn’t too fussed about it. I sing, so therefore choir came quite naturally. I didn’t go down there with my voice as my main instrument though as I wanted to concentrate on my guitar work so I didn’t volunteer for any solo parts. We “learnt” (yes, I use that term very loosely) five songs to perform at our sharing event and all went extremely well.

The workshops and seminars were fine. They all had their own style and flair and I was able to take bits that I could use in my music making and gain a deeper understanding of other aspects of music-ing that I wasn’t familiar with.

What may come as a surprise to some is that ensemble was the part I was least looking forward to. I haven’t performed in a group since 2016 and I wasn’t planning on going back to it anytime soon. It may sound over the top but I couldn’t think of anything worse than being back in a performing band and that’s why I make music the way I do now, in the studio with my best mate. As it happens, I was placed with some pretty good people in my group. And I’m not talking about good musicians, even though they are, I mean good people in all aspects of life. This definitely helped to ease me back in to a performers life and even with a mid-week slump where I just wanted to go home, I felt I couldn’t let them down.

Danielle – what a voice! I feel she didn’t get to show it off to its full capacity but there’s some Janis Joplin-esque power there. Georgia – a voice that covers all genres and some beautiful piano playing, which she didn’t show off at the performance unfortunately but between the ensemble and choir you could see that she has some serious skills. Kathy – the Queen of Mom Rock! A great voice, some top accompanying guitar work and a mind for lyrical storytelling that was inspiring. Justin – proper sound! Justin decided to challenge himself by playing drums for the week. I’m not sure if there were some early week nerves but come Saturday he was a different player and definitely settled in to the role. All’s I can say is well done. You challenged yourself and won. Patrick – this guy has some serious bass skills. He came up with a beautiful bass chord progression to kick start our original composition and just instinctively knew what to play and when to play it. Ant – what can I say about this guy. A genuine gentleman who I connected with from day one. I’m so glad that we ended up in the same group and I genuinely feel that I have a friend for life there. His guitar work is top draw and he came up with some amazing licks and mini solos that suited the music perfectly. It also happens that he can hold a note with his voice too. Bringing the songs together was tricky as we had very limited time and God only knows how we managed to pull it off but by Saturday we had three songs ready to go!

The sharing event on was amazing and every group did exceptionally well. There was so much talent on show and every single person should be super proud of themselves. The wine was flowing, spirits were high and a good time was had. Don’t even get me started on Huw and his chaise longue! (it’s a story for another time but “laugh” doesn’t begin to cover it!!)

All in all it was a great experience. People say too often “make sure you stay in touch” but never do. I personally am going to make every effort to stay in touch with as many of my new friends as possible. Our little WhatsApp group has grown in numbers over the week and I am here for it. The more the merrier!

So, to anyone that spent the week with me who reads this, thank you for being awesome. Every single one of you.