Songwriting workshops with Commoners Choir
The four workshops will be divided into two – the first two dates will concentrate on songwriting and the second two on learning and rehearsing the song.
In the songwriting sessions we will first look at the basic craft of songwriting and how songs have been an important part of the way we tell stories and construct our own histories.
We will talk about Undercliffe cemetery and the stories that are (quite literally) buried here. We will focus on two or three relevant stories that are centred in the cemetery and talk about what these stories tell us; how specific stories can become ‘universal’ (the root of songwriting).
Across the two sessions we will collectively decide on which story to tell, and how we want to tell it. Will it be sad, and mournful? Will it tell us something about ourselves? Will it look to our own lives and – while writing about the past, will it talk about our present and future? Will it be a commemoration, a celebration of those who had notable lives and are buried in Undercliffe? Will it be a lament for those who occupy the unmarked pauper’s graves?
In the first session we will decide together what sort of song we want to write collectively (and which we will eventually perform), but also give space if people want to write their own song. We will split into small groups of three or four to brainstorm ideas and write them down, including any snatches of lyric. We’ll read these and see if any more ideas come to us. Then Boff will take everything away and begin to form it into a song structure.
In the following session we will look at what we have and expand on it, talking about the basic song idea and adding other thoughts, other verses, everyone having a chance to be included in the process. This is a chance to add to what we collected in the first session, and to make a collective decision on the general musical ‘feel’ of the song. We will sing small parts of our ‘song’ to see what works and what doesn’t.
In the third and fourth sessions we will finalise and rehearse the song, work on harmonies and counter-melodies, and practice it up to performance level. We will also think about how we want to present the song visually in the cemetery; how we want the film to reflect the ideas in the song.
Simply click the link below to book your place on the workshops
Thanks to Stephen Goodfellow for the great image of the Commoners Choir