Bite Size Vibes

Sam speaks to Rachel Tribe, a clinical psychologist at University College London whose research interests include exploring the relationship between creativity and mental health. They discuss the clinical research on creativity, her perspective on the work of Good Vibrations, and the pros and cons delivering a project via WhatsApp!

Creativity And Mental Health with Rachel Tribe

Sam speaks to Paul Brewer from Sound Minds, an amazing service user led arts and mental health charity based in Battersea in South West London. They discuss the power and healing effect of collaborative music making, the benefits of being a service user led organisation, and the interesting differences as well as similarities between their work and the work of Good Vibrations.

Sound Minds with Paul Brewer

Sam speaks to Russ Haynes, co-host of Bite Sized Vibes, and a past-participant and advocate for Good Vibrations for over a decade, who now produces and presents his own radio show. He tells the story of his first encounter with Good Vibrations as a participant living in a half-way house hostel after a period in prison, and how it impacted his life.

Learning To Feel Again with Russ Haynes

Sam speaks to Mags Smith, a community musician and workshop facilitator for Good Vibrations. As well as playing gamelan she sings and plays flute and penny whistle - some of which you’ll hear in this episode. She is also a storyteller, registered with the Scottish Storytelling Centre, and in this episode she reveals how and why she discovered a passion for storytelling, and the relationship between storytelling and healing.  She also treats us to two magical stories!

Medicine Stories with Mags Smith

Sam speaks to Jeremy Gilbert, a cultural and political theory academic at the University of London, as well as a long time DJ and historian of dance music culture. They speak about gamelan music, and the concepts of affect and collective joy in relation to communal music making, prison and mental health.

Collective Joy with Jeremy Gilbert

Russ talks to Bobby about his time in prison and what he felt when he took part on a Good Vibrations course.

Interview with Bobby, a past participant

Russ talks to Errol, a past particpant, about what he thinks about the Black Lives Matter movement.

An interview with Errol about the Black Lives Matter movement

Russ talks to Kieran about his work at Good Vibrations, inlcuding the Loophole music project

An interview with Kieran Plunkett

Russ talk to Malcolm Milner, the Training & Development at Good Vibrations, gamelan teacher and musician.

Interview with Malcolm Milner

Russ talks to Katy Haigh, Executive Director at Good Vibrations, about what she does at the charity and the positive impact GV's work makes.

Squeeze In Tight

An interview with Katy Haigh

Russ and Ellen created this wonderful programme about Good Vibrations.  Set against some beautiful music created on our projects, they interview key people in the organisation about the positive impact of playing gamelan on a GV course.

The Good Vibrations Of Gamelan Music

Russ interviews Errol about how he became a spoken word poet and about his live performances.  Errol was a past participant on a Good Vibrations course and offers insight into the power of the arts.

Interview with Errol about becoming a poet

Past GV participant and advisor Russ interviews Professor E. Aminudin Aziz, Education and Culture Attaché from the Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia in London, on all things gamelan, Indonesia and what makes the work of Good Vibrations unique.

HMP Stoke Heath

Professor Aziz Interview

This week on Bite Size Vibes, Russ interviews facilitator Nikki Kemp, who has been involved with Good Vibrations since the beginning. They chat about music and mindfulness, how she came to gamelan and why Good Vibrations projects work.

Interview with Nikki Kemp

Good Vibrations is a registered charity (number 1126493) that helps prisoners, patients in secure hospitals, ex-prisoners and others in the community to develop crucial life and work skills through participating in intensive Gamelan (Indonesian bronze percussion) courses. Since 2003 Good Vibrations has worked with more than 3200 participants in 49 different secure institutions. Gamelan is an extremely effective tool for achieving our aims:

- It is very accessible
- You don’t need to have any previous musical experience
- You don’t need to be able to read music
- It’s easy to learn the basics
- It’s a very communal activity - there is no overall conductor or leader and 
  everyone’s contribution is equally important
- You have to listen to everyone else to fit your own part in

A Good Vibrations project typically runs as a week-long course for a group of 15 - 20 participants. Most will not have done anything musical before. At the end of the week the group puts on an informal performance. Each performance is recorded and a CD is produced, a copy of which is given to everyone who has taken part. Participants will benefit enormously from the short but intensive experience.

Bite Size Vibes

goodvibrations.org