This resource includes five videos showing examples of inclusive music practice in action: fun musical activities for young musicians to learn about tempo, rhythm, melody and turn-taking. You don't have to be an experienced music leader to use them as all the activities are fully explained and contextualised.

For more resources on inclusive music practice, visit www.drakemusic.org/think22/.

Let's Make Music (Audio)

Tracks created with The Remix - an inclusive youth performance company for young disabled and non-disabled people aged 12 to 19. 

As part of Planted Symphony we delivered inclusive music making activities in some of the areas we toured to. In Dorset we worked with Dorset Music Hub and The Remix, combining Planted Symphony tech and ideas with their theme of Gossip. Here are some of the tracks we created together.

What’s the goss

05 Section 3 - Tempo

04 Section 2 - How To Use

03 Section 1 - Let's Make Music

02 Index

01 Cover Sheet

10 Section 8 - Background

Juicy Tracksuit - Maara 
Left/Right - Dual Monitor 
Helix - Amaliah 
Traquetea - Some Guest 
Stir the Pot, Rock the Boat - Bass Butches 
BIYU - Kontronatura 
Pitch Down - KiNK 
stop being deep - xupid 
Gentle Romance - Saoirse 
Dance Enchantress - LUXE 
Devotion - Elisa Bee 
Lobster Telephone - Peggy Gou 
Morning Disco Tonic Bongo - Belaria

015 LiZZi 4 QueenswaY

The third offering in our mix series is a live recording of Priori and Cousin's dj set at Sustain Release 2024. Recorded on the last morning between 6am and 1pm on what was meant to be an ambient stage, it featured everything a 3 day festival closing set should. Eclectic picks, strange and emotional sounds, dubious transitions and a few feigned endings. Massive thanks to all the dancers, the Sustain staff (Aurora, Ash and everybody else who put their blood, sweat and tears into this), the music makers, the birds, the stars. 

Much love,

P & C

@secondcousins x @priori-ties

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naffcast003 ⦾ Cousin & Priori ༻ Sustain Release 2024 Bossa Nova Stage closing set ༺ ❁

Tracklist:

Someday - J Wax
Positif (Forbid's Future Edit) - Mr. Ozio
206 South - Saol Nua
Firebreak (Chloé Caillet Remix) - Confidence Man
Batenko - Omuera Bamba
The One Who Spoke is No Longer Here - CucaRafa
Babe - Elkka
Wanna Feel (Extended) - DJ IP, Pegassi
Will You Remember Me When I'm Gone? - DJ Heartstring
All Night - shftr
Fatzer - Batenko
Max Wave - Suite Simone

022 Dan Chan 4 QueenswaY

A new track created by Disabled musician Hannah Shelmerdine, based in the North West of England, inspired by the feeling of sailing and being out on the water. Hannah takes the listener on a journey with her, from an intimate opening with the sound of waves through to an expansive melodic theme on the clarinet.

Hannah's process is based in experimentation, with this piece being built first in Logic and then combined with sounds from clarinetist Rachael Moat. Hannah and Rachael took a collaborative approach, with Hannah directing and Rachael improvising to create the final sounds.

Surge of the Sails

Surge Of The Sails - Hannah Shelmerdine

Image description: a photograph of a deserted road and cycle path stretching into the distance, with the sunset disappearing behind a bridge that stretches across the road. Wisps of sky. It looks autumnal.

Lyrics:
Have you crossed the sea to be here?
Are you shielding from the year?
Are you perched on a knife?

Would they withhold the kiss of life?
Are you drowned out by the noise?
Are your tools different?
Maybe you should be in charge.

Watering the leaves while letting all the roots die
Burning down the house and calling it a festival
What are we recovering from?
And what are we recovering for?

I want to roll the world on its side
And keep the airways clear
Hold its head in my hands
And put someone else…

About the Track
‘What does inclusive recovery mean to you as an artist?’ A question prompted by the #weshallnotberemoved disability rights movement.

The answer to this seems obvious to me: the voices and needs of those who have been overlooked and marginalised historically (D/deaf & disabled, people of colour, neurodivergent people, sexual minorities, trans and non-binary people, migrants) lead the recovery. We do not go back to the way things were, because they were leading us towards greater inequality, climate catastrophe, social breakdown. The very way the world has been built and designed has made it harder to manage the Covid-19 pandemic, let alone the ideas and philosophies underpinning it.

In reflecting on this question, and making this track, I was especially grateful to read the Migrants in Culture: Inclusive Recovery manifesto; for Rachel Nwokoro’s interview in Exeunt Magazine where she says “the thing that the arts industry doesn’t do for disabled people is create space and time,” and for Magical Women’s article, I Cannot Stand By and Watch this Happen Any More. How Can I Make Them See? I also think Zoe Leonard’s poem, “I Want A President” expresses many of these sentiments powerfully.

Composing the track
For me, life feels scattered, held together barely by the monotony of lockdown. The days are eerily empty. And we’re watching the sector try to rebuild haphazardly. 

I found an old recording of when Gemma Nash and I put a contact mic on her wheelchair and used it as a percussive instrument, with reverb and corpus effects in Ableton. For me, it captured this sense of loss, bereavement, but also rebuilding and construction, and has become the backdrop for the track.

Originally, I used a piano preset in Ableton, but it felt a bit too Bond-like and dramatic with the chords. So I chose a sweeper pad instead. Still dramatic, except now it feels much more sci-fi. And lonely. Reminds me a bit of Peter Davison’s 'Winds of Space' album. And on an even nerdier note, this is also the first track where I’ve started to think about panning and mastering the track in more detail. Another step towards becoming a more self-sufficient artist and music producer (I hope).

SEPTEMBER - Put Someone Else

Anaxity Of Space

Transcript:

[Audio: wavering electronic drone, shimmering in the background. A tune rises and falls steadily on notes like a distant organ. The tune repeats, steadily continuing as voices begin]

Hugh: Hello? Is anyone there? It’s all dark…

Hu2: Me. I’m here. 

Hugh: Hello. My name’s Hugh. Who are you?

Hu2: My name’s Hu2. 

Hugh: Really? What a coincidence. To have the same name.

Hu2: No. My name is Hu2. Spelled ‘H - U - number 2’

Hugh: OK. What are you doing here?

Hu2: I’m here to observe and remember.

Hugh: Same here. What a coincidence.

Hu2: Is this a waiting room?

Hugh: I think he’s put tape on the camera.

[As the rising and falling tune continues, we hear playful calm notes played sporadically on a xylophone over the top of the lower more solemn drone.]

Both (in unison): Now he’s removing it. The camera is pointed up-close towards a black background. There is light coming from above. A post-it note pasted to the background reads: ”It’s Day 93 in the Anxious Mansion” There is also a dust mask dangling from the top of the screen. And now it is going dark again.

NOVEMBER - The Opening

As my Drake Music residency draws 'officially' to a close, now seems like a good time to revisit a piece of music I co-created with my fellow Artists in Residence, Sonia Allori and Elinor Rowlands. 

Created in response to a fun prompt of 'what would hold music sound like if you rang Drake Music', this track is built out of interviews with members of the Drake Music staff, and works with material that Sonia and Elinor created together for a podcast while I was taking some compassionate leave near the beginning of the residency. The whole thing was arranged in Ableton, and went through a few mastering phases.

In September, I wrote this small fragment, reminiscing on the process (see below) but it's worth highlighting that this track would not have been possible with the creativity and compassion of my fellow Drake Music AiRs and the Drake Music team.

...

"It's our first day at Drake Music. Elinor, Sonia and I have never met before. We're nervous but excited, put pen to paper and write what we're feeling, look at each other's web sites and listen to each other's music. Then, Daryl, the Programme Manager, gets a sharpie and draws a big spider diagram of who everyone is, on a big piece of paper. And then another piece of paper. The web is full of tangles and criss-crosses. Gradually, faces are connected to names as members of the team walk in the room. We ask them questions. 'What does Drake Music sound like?' - 'What colour are you?' 

We've been tasked with making a piece of music that will play when people ring the office and are put 'on hold'.

Life is put on hold. Lockdown. Bereavement. Isolation

In the daze of days melting into each other, I draw drum patterns in Ableton: sprightly but sparse and skeletal. Warm baths of synthesiser fizz and subside, reverb trails stretching into the distance. I start slicing up recordings of Carien, Joy, Miryam, Louis, Tim, Elinor, Sonia and me. Our voices become propulsive parts of the composition. It's a jig saw puzzle but instead of putting it together, I'm taking it apart, so voices bathe and float in the spaces."

DECEMBER - Hold On / On Hold

A new work created for EWI during a residency with Drake Music at the end of 2020.

Curiouser

Leaders in music, disability and technology, Drake Music use innovative ideas and technology to open access to music making. We put quality music-making at the heart of everything we do, connecting Disabled and non-disabled artists locally, nationally and internationally. We are educators, curators, innovators and advocates. We believe everyone has the right to express themselves creatively through music.

10 Section 8 - Background

Drake Music

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