Joy of Sound

On May day, we were involved in the Sensorium 2010 workshop that Joy of Sound put on each year.  It is an amazing three day event of international folk music and dance workshops and performances, exhibits, art and food.  Joy of Sound is 'an inclusive arts project that provides workshops and equipment to enable everybody, regardless of their abilities and dexterity, to enjoy taking part in music making and other arts activities'.  Jam volunteers at Joy of Sound, helping mend the instruments and encouraging the playing.  That is why our boat looks more like a musical instrument mending workshop, but I don't mind - our kitchen is huge compared to the corridor we had on the narrowboat so it doesn't feel too cramped and it's kind of nice seeing lots of instruments in various states of repair as you walk in, anyway, I digress - back to the Sensorium...

We were dazzled from the moment we stepped foot into the courtyard, by an astounding collection of hanging windchimes and decorated instruments.  The smell of the horses from the City farm next door made it feel like we were out in the countryside and the lighting inside the church was fantastic and atmospheric.  We played the music for the wheelchair friendly maypole dance, Jam played violin I played recorder and there was a chap playing the hurdy gurdy - which is a fabulous name for an instrument, don't you think? 

(A hurdy gurdy pic, taken from the web)

 
There was a drum circle, a harpist who insisted we all dance, Jam and I cha-cha-cha'd around the room at a mighty pace ~ it was exhilirating!  We watched Slovakian dancers skipping around decorated glass bottles and performers with some crazy bamboo bassoon type instruments, Eritrean dancers.  At the end there was a group drumming and instrument session and Squirrel found it a bit too much and kicked me out of the room, to rest on a bale of hay and chat with Terry and his guide dog Ken.  A lovely chap, we had a good giggle, we then helped clear up, I was given some flowers made out of balloons by Miss Ballooniverse, then Jam and I scooted through the rain to the subway where we started busking with an acoustic bass guitar and treble recorder ~ quite an inebriated chap stopped us in the swing of 'can't buy me love' to say that we needed a hat for people to put money in ~ good point, well presented, with this I threw down my scarf, added a few lonely coins as bate, but sadly didn't catch much.  We blamed it on the weather and Jam gave up due to blisters, so we skipped home via a pub meal, which was absolutely delicious and our anniversary treat!