Music & People - The Community Music podcast Neil Valentine

"In 2016 Lisa Tregale (then Head of Participation at BSO) said to me something along the lines of ‘the reason you're an associate of the BSO is that you are bombproof’. This has stuck with me. My first reaction to this was ‘damn right I am!’. And just to be clear, she was damn right, and I am. But the implications have stayed with me since then, churning around my head. What she meant was that I could go into any group, any age, any mix of people and create something meaningful with them usin...

"What fascinates me about music leading? About music making? For me, It’s all about music and people. These two threads I have woven together in my work over many years. Sometimes it’s mostly about the music as the group are engaged, skilled and motivated. Sometimes it’s mostly about the people if group members have difficulties of various kinds. But always it’s about how these two elements interact."In this episode Neil goes through how music and people have intertwined for him and why these...

"What is a Musical Force? Not what, but who. Who is a musical force? Who moves music making forward? The obvious answer is the conductor. The conductor has some music, she knows how it should go and so she rehearses a group to realise her vision of how the music goes. That is an excellent way of being a Musical Force. And it is especially effective when there is a coherent group of skilled individuals who all understand their roles and jobs within the group and use the conductor as the f...