Summertime Sounds from the PICU Ward

This performance and recording was the culmination of a three week learning pathway which consisted of three components:

1. The young person learned a series of  chords (and later melody lines) on ukulele, guitar and keyboard. Being new to the stringed instruments this meant she had to work very hard to acquire the basic chord positions and strumming patterns.

2. The young person was then given a choice of songs which she could apply her new skills to. This was Three Little Birds by Bob Marley. We then made a simple duet arrangement and learned the song together. She was then asked to nominate a song of her choice which was “Summertime Sadness”. This became the focus for her recording project.

3. There then ensued a series of intensive rehearsal sessions. A particularly rewarding and fruitful aspect of this component was collaborating  to create a unique duet arrangement of the song using all three instruments and switching between them during performance.  We used an Ipad app called Garageband to record, playback and analyse each working version until we arrived at the final arrangement which was then recorded and shared.

This was an intensive and joyful project which involved a great deal of creativity, commitment, collaboration and fun.