John Woolrich and Sacconi Quartet Workshop

Today Year 5 were treated to an amazing musical experience – we all had the wonderful opportunity to participate in a composing workshop with professional composer John Woolrich and the fabulous Sacconi Quartet!

We explored lots of different ideas about what makes music, what we like and don’t like to hear, experimented with mixing up different sounds and ideas in response to symbols, had a go at conducting and created our own mini pieces of music –  ‘Grey Skies’, ‘Dark Summer’, ‘Titanic’, ‘All Over The Place!’. We made choices about dynamics, pitch, duration, tempo and types of sounds and feelings we wanted to include in our music. We also had to decide what order to play things in, to give our music a shape or structure. There was a lot to think about and we gained in confidence as we realised that in music there is no wrong or right answer!

We gave our brains a break by playing some fun music games – Zip! Zap! Boing! and Pass The Sound Around. At the end of the workshop the Sacconi Quartet played a piece of music for two violins, viola, cello and voice. It was such a special experience to be so close to the instruments playing live. We were immersed in their beautiful sound and could actually feel the musical vibrations in our bodies as we listened. Some children and adults said it made them feel very emotional. We loved every minute of our workshop and have come away feeling inspired and empowered to compose more of our own music!