Rally Reviews
light, being made from very thin tone
woods. This coupled with low tension nylon
strings produces a mellow and fairly soft
tone. The frets were adjustable, made of
gut tied tightly around the neck with some
strings paired an octave apart like the
12 string guitar. The lutes were different
sizes and tunings. The main challenge was
trying to quickly learn the medieval form
of tablature for lute that uses letters for
the frets, starting with ‘a’ for open string. I
had the pleasure of discussing construction
and intonation with the luthier who had
made the lute I was using. We played some
pieces together – not a great performance
but nevertheless quite musical. A really interesting workshop and
thoroughly recommended if it is available at the next Rally.
Bruce Murray, Mandolin Orchestra of Devon
• David Griffiths - Performing with Confidence – Being your
best through self mastery
Wobbly knees, sweaty palms, shaky fingers, tummy butterflies,
music swimming before eyes. If you recognise these symptoms,
this workshop is for you! David equipped us with essentials to
cope with performing in public, and to do it with confidence. It is
important to know the music well and to have solved problems with
it otherwise we fall at first hurdle. Some aspects we covered were:
using imagination to visualise performing well; seeing ourselves as
others see us on stage and playing to best ability; going through
performance step by step in mind and creating positive mental
image of whole event to reaffirm we can cope with anything that
might occur; quietening inner destructive voice and replacing it with
positive, supportive voice reminding us we are best we can be at
stage we are at, right now, focusing on the moment, our music and
performing a piece we love that the audience has come to hear;
remembering we learn from mistakes and audience is friend not foe.
Some strategies will take practice but others like remembering to
breathe(!) I used the following day and felt more relaxed and played
more confidently. If one hour can make this difference, imagine what
a day could do!
Catherine Crawford, EMGO
• Simon Mayor - Lose your music; lose your inhibitions
Simon started us off with the basics of improvisation. He took a
simple tune, established the appropriate chord pattern, in this case
G then D7 and encouraged the group to improvise around the notes
in the chord using any rhythm. Some brave souls had a go at this
and then at throwing in other notes from the scale. Then we moved
onto a blues scale using a flattened 7th plus a flattened 3rd played
immediately before 3rd. Wow! Instant blues. Pollywollydoodle will
never be the same again! We had such fun with this, there wasn’t
much time left for the basics of playing by ear. However, Simon took
us through establishing the root note of a tune and training the ear
to recognise intervals; he particularly recommended using the tonic
sol-fa as being a very useful tool for this. Some of us didn’t quite lose
our inhibitions but the session was very informative and great fun!
Cathy Cox, London Mandolin Ensemble
•Mandolin Quartet Seasons – Bulgarian Folklore Music
I was really looking forward to this workshop and I wasn’t
disappointed. Evdokia Bobotsova first gave us a brief history of
traditional Bulgarian music, instruments and time signatures using
6
projected slides and recorded
sounds, which was fascinating
and much more varied than I
could have imagined.The gaida
(bagpipe), kaval (flute), tŭpan
(drum), tambura (long-necked
lute) and tarabuka (drum)
were all shown, and then the
fun started – hearing and
learning music in ‘asymmetric
meters’ such as 7/16, 9/16 and 11/16. Evdokia said “It’s easy, you
count 7/16 as 2-2-3 and 11/16 as 2-2-3-2-2”. Yeah right! They
patiently led 1st and 2nd mandolins, mandolas and guitars through
Vrachanska Rachenitsa (in 7/16)