SHEEPFOLDS AND MUSIC

Two professional musicians devised separate music projects using Andy Goldsworthy's sheepfolds as a stimulus. In both cases they also successfully combined an understanding of local history, folklore and folk music with the development of children's music and songwriting skills.

At Dent CE School, near Sedbergh, Carolyn Francis based her musical work on the school's music scheme of 'pulse and rhythm'. She accompanied twenty Year 5/6 pupils to the Casterton folds to record a 'soundscape' of found sounds and the beat the children created as they used the boulders as percussion instruments. This visit was then extended to Keswick Museum where the pupils were taught various drumming patterns on the Victorian 'Rock Xylophone'. Again, these rythmns were recorded and later mixed with a local hornpipe tune and a song composed by the children back at school, to produce a fascinating and unusual tape of the project's outcome.

As the musician Carolyn Francis explained, 'during the time available, we managed to make the tape; write a song including a whistle tune, played by children who had never played whistle before; form a band, including percussion and fiddle players, to play for a dance involving sticks and rocks which we made up. (The tune we used was collected in Dent in 1909 by the composer Vaughan Williams.)'

Artist
Carolyn Francis

Contact teacher Simon Cheer, Headteacher. Tel: 015396 25259

Photographs: (1 & 2) Carolyn Francis teaches children to play the rock xylophone at Keswick Museum; (3 & 4) rehearsing the band and dancers.

The musician Mike Willoughby outlined his aims for the workshops at St Bridget's CE School at Parton, near Whitehaven, in the following way:

'To give children experience of folk-singing, multi-instrumental playing and song composition.

Through our visit to the site, we would:

Construct a word bank of images, sounds, textures and visual sketches to: compose songs about our visit;

compose a 'big ballad' song based on the sheepfold site, combining our observations, imaginings and historical themes.'

The whole Year 5/6 class visited Mungrisdale composing songs on the journey and at the site. As Mike Willoughby explained, 'Goldsworthy states that [the sheepfolds] become yet another layer which makes a place richer and, in doing this, the sheepfold becomes a forum for a story or an idea.' We explored this by inventing a 19th century narrative song, 'Atkinson's Party', peopling the sheepfold site with local characters and happenings. Even the stones themselves became imagined characters (Sasha the Fish, Rocky etc). These stories and ideas indeed became the 'other layer' to our song making, enriching (and being enriched by) our own present experience of the site.'

This wonderfully inventive and imaginative song cycle was completed at school and presented as a musical performance to parents and friends in the local village hall in October 2000. The Headteacher summed up the benefits of the whole programme: 'The pupils gained a great deal from the project. The literacy skills and musical experiences are the obvious learning, but the children were so enthusiastic about the work that they learned a huge amount about cooperation and the importance of team work. They increased their awareness of, and appreciation for, the heritage of their community and the Lake District. Their confidence and self-esteem also benefited.'

Artist Mike Willoughby
Contact teacher Mrs E Highton, Headteacher. Tel: 01946 852654

Photographs: Mike Willoughby accompanying the 'big ballad.