I just thought I should mention a few exciting things I’m doing.
Workshop at Heart of Worcestershire College
Tomorrow I am running my second singing worshop with the performing arts students at Heart of Worcestershire College. At the first workshop a few weeks, ago I taught the students a custom made arrangement I did for them, of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”, did some one to one work with one brave student and touched very briefly on lots of different aspect of singing, particularly relating to singing in the musical theatre genre.
Tomorrow I’m going over the harmony parts again and going into more depth about the vocal technique. I really hope that more of the students are brave enough to let me work with them. They are such a sweet bunch and I know how much I can help them.
Exciting news from a long term student
Over a year ago I met a nice young man who told me he is a singer in the Punjabi music but was interested in working in different genres. On the third or fourth lesson he told me that he had, in fact, had one of the biggest hits in the Punjabi music scene in the previous year. The day before one of his lessons he told me that he had been zipwired into the British Asian Awards at the NIA and won the award for Best Male Act http://www.britasiamusicawards.com/.
His name is Jaz Dhami and he is away for work a lot and works harder than any other students I have worked with.
In August Jaz told me he had had a call to go to a recording studio in London to record a line in a song that was being released for Children in Need. Stevie Wonder and Pharrell are on the song, and Emelie Sande and so many other exciting people. And I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone. I’m not good at keeping secrets but I’m very proud to say that I did.
I managed to keep it secret till the date it was shown all over the BBC a few weeks ago. And even then I couldn’t shout out with pride about how Jaz is my student. I don’t believe in shouting about something until someone officially says it’s ok to do so. Then Jaz sent me a lovely review which I’ve posted on my testimonials page https://rebeccaschwarz.co.uk/accolades/ and I can now shout about the video. Jaz has a prize slot straight after One Direction. He’s hanging on a ladder wearing yellow. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqLTe8h0-jo
My Next Show – The Jukebox ShowAnd (almost), last but not least. My next show, The Jukebox Show, is officially taking happening.
It’s 15 January 2015 at the Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath, Birmingham. I sold tickets on Kickstarter and I decided that I needed to sell 40 tickets to cover costs. I sold 48 on the Kickstarter account and another 9 since. So as the small room only holds maximum 60 seasts I am now doing the show in the large room!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/73925013/rebecca-schwarz-but-for-the-lack-of-hindsight
The deal with the Kickstarter account was that anyone who bought a ticket through that site coiuld choose songs for me to sing in the show. I’m really, really happy with the songs that hav been chosen and am now going to start putting the show together.
I can seat another 33 people at the show so if you want any tickets it’s first come first served. I have 5 more tickets that are provisionally taken but I’m only putting names on the guestlist when I’ve got the payment. If you want one, or more, of the tickets send me an email to Rebeccasingingteacher@gmail.com and I’ll tell you how to pay for the ticket to be sure of getting a seat.
(For anyone who’s interested the profits after paying everyone on the evening, is going into the next big project. Which is still a secret but I hope to be able to shout about around Christmas time).
Piano ExamI am sitting my piano grade 5 in just over 2 weeks. I have worked so hard on this exam, practicing almost every day but I still feel nowhere near ready. I now entirely understand the fear students feel in the run up to their exams. I really hope that in a little over a month I can share that I’ve passed the exam but I am so nervous abotu this exam and my left hand is still not very obedient so I take nothing at all for granted.