Concept Music Residency at Northampton College

During February half-term the Concept team delivered their latest music residency at Northampton College.  This was an exciting new way of working for them, as the team were based in the music department of the college and supported by six music students, who were gaining experience of inclusive music projects as part of their course.  Together, the Concept team and music students worked with fifteen young people from the Tamil, Russian and Ghanaian supplementary schools to create their own concept album featuring their own original music.

Joining the team for the first time was composer and multi-instrumentalist Elio Andrade, who used his considerable skill to lead group instrumental pieces.  As well as being a singer, Elio can play most instruments to a very high standard, so was able to help the young people with learning new skills on the guitar, piano and drum kit.  He also found time to work with the music students and develop a medley of Beatles songs, which they performed for the young participants. The young people then reviewed the performance as part of their learning towards an Arts Award qualification; they really enjoyed seeing a full band playing. 

The music students are talented musicians and producers, and really enjoyed working with Elio and the young people.  They supported the young participants with their music development: teaching guitar, drums, piano and helping them to write lyrics. Assistant Music Leader Tian also supported the young people, guiding them through the process of lyric writing and using Logic Pro to create arrangements.

The young people created an album called 'P6wer', with track titles including: The Power of Sound, Power Coaster, Power, Naangu, La Femme Fatal, and Women In Power.  To mark the end of the week and celebrate the young people's achievements, the Concept team held a sharing session.  An audience of twenty five parents, siblings and carers came to listen to the music the young participants had created throughout the week, and were were also treated to live performances from Josh, Emanuella, Timurs and Nik.  This showcase was extra special as Mithuna, Ashana and Rasika performed some fantastic Bollywood-style dancing, wearing beautiful traditional costume.  The team also really enjoyed hearing the song that Ashvin, Praveen and Thiso wrote and sang in Tamil; it was called Naanga meaning ‘Us’, and was a song about community and friendships.