The new weekly BIG SING! group for Dunmanway starts next Monday 2nd November from 7.30-9pm at the Family Resource Centre on Kilbarry Rd. Along with the new and varied set of songs for the next BIG SING! event, this group will be bringing a collection of more unusual Christmas songs along to the Tree of Remembrance Ceremony on 19th December on the square.
I am starting a new Youth Music project this coming Autumn from The Attic Youth Cafe in Bantry. In this project I aim to provide a sporting and creative environment for 12-18 year olds to explore their voices in Acapella harmony singing. We will be including movement and dance and they will be encouraged to share their own ideas into the content.
The group will run on Monday evenings from 5-6.30pm from now up until Xmas, with a view to continuing into the next year.
Three local groups have now emerged from the West Cork BIG SING! held on Bantry Square for World Mental Health Day. More groups are hoped to be started in the Spring with the project moving across towards the Clonakilty area. Anyone interested in helping to start up a BIG SING! group in their area should get in touch. A training package is currently being developed to train facilitators in leading the groups.
https://www.facebook.com/West-Cork-BIG-SING-895356410540154/
The West Cork BIG SING! event on Saturday 10th October for Mental Health Day was a huge success and is now forming localised groups…..we are creating a BIG SING! Community! The new BIG SING! Bantry Group are meeting this coming Saturday 17th October 3-5pm in the Christian Fellowship Hall behind Cinemax. This will be a monthly group for the time being. Two more weekly groups are starting, one in Castletown Bere on Sunday 25th October 2.30-4pm in the Sarah Walker Gallery, and the other in Dunmanway from the Family Resource Centre on Monday 2nd November 7.30-9pm. Please help to spread the word……Come along and join the West Cork BIG SING! Community!!
Last weekend I traveled over to the UK to attend a workshop with the focus on training for leading group singing. What a beautiful place and group of people to spend that time with! My personal interest lay more in simply putting myself totally ‘in the zone’ so to speak, as I participated and explored my thoughts around what our facilitator Susie Ro Prater was bringing into this course, with a view on expanding on my own training course I am currently developing.
Susie is a lovely facilitator and a truly gifted musician…the song just oozed through her and her teaching style was very inspiring and relaxing to work with. We shared many songs during those few days. The room was full of enthusiastic individuals wishing to hone their own skills and start sharing and leading others in song….a very exciting energy to be in.
Now I more fully realise the potential of what I have to offer with regards to offering my own skills as not only a facilitator, but also as a trainer….to pass what I have learned over the past 12 years on to others and provide continued support where needed. And how nice for me to enjoy the experience without being in a leadership role!!
This coming winter will find me harvesting and gathering, then emerging in the spring ready to enter the world of training others to do the work which I have loved for so long……enabling and supporting others to enjoy singing with others.
Really looking forwards to launching the West Cork BIG SING! at this new festival being held in Bantry. Here is the full programme for the event.
Caz Jeffreys 