Pumpkins and Princesses
We had a fantastic week of Halloween concerts, with some very spookily dressed Wrigglers! Mini pumpkins, skeletons, ghosts and vampires (and their Mums, Dads and carers!) joined us in Balerno, Stockbridge, South Queensferry and Morningside for a programme of Halloween-inspired music. We loved this programme and had a lot of fun putting it together and performing it. We almost sold out in South Queensferry but were able to run another show straight afterwards; a first for us! We were grateful to Queensferry Parish Church for enabling us to do this.
Next stop was The Princess and the Pea in brand new venues, with several brand new arrangements! Our week began in Marchmont, where the audience braved the gales to attend. We very much enjoyed performing in this hall, and the fabulous Butterflies Cafe ensured that the audience could warm up with a cuppa! Cheers!
On Tuesday we played at the fabulous Honey Pot Ceramics – http://www.honeypotceramics.com a venue that we had a lot of fun in (and didn’t manage to break anything!)! The weather again was pretty awful, but that didn’t deter our audience of Wrigglers, who dried out and warmed up in the cosy studio. Many of our audience members had fun painting and decorating items made in the studio (as did Louise and her Wrigglers!). Juliet from Honey Pot Ceramics was a wonderful host and we can’t wait to play in her fantastic studio again!
After a private visit to Dalmeny Nursery, the final concert of the week was at Leith Library, a wonderful building with very helpful staff. Unfortunately there wasn’t any sunshine, but our audience of attentive Wrigglers thoroughly brightened up the day!
So now we can relax? Not yet! Today we performed to MUSAC, a wonderful community group in Livingston who blew us away with their foot stomping to Brahms! Our lovely, and efficient, marketing consultant, Emma Walker, has been busy behind the scenes programming our Christmas concerts, which will be announced in the next few days, so watch out for details. So it’s time for us to dust off the tinsel and get festive!
Keep Wriggling!
Halloween week!
Following Louise’s graduation this weekend (clever girl) we ran through our programme to her parents!! We can’t believe that it’s a whole year since we played this recital. We really enjoyed revisiting it – there are lots of visual gags and some fabulous music.
It has been tricky getting ticket sales in areas a bit further afield. Balerno being one which isn’t selling so well. If any of our readers have contact or ideas we’d love to hear from you.
We received great news from the Edinburgh Fringe office – we can use the ‘SOLD OUT’ logo for our next Fringe outing! Quite an achievement considering it was our first year. Thank you all for supporting it.
Wonderful Emma has been a great help with this block and preparing a set of recitals next month in brand new venues – we can’t wait to meet new wrigglers!
As ever, we rely on your support, ideas and word of mouth to make sure we can entertain as many little folk, and their carers, as possible!
Keep in touch – see you this week somewhere around Edinburgh!
Flying the Fringe
What a great time we had at the Edinburgh fringe, performing six sellout shows. We premiered a brand new piece by Eugene Skeef, which went down a storm and had everyone grooving! Our gingerbread men supplies constantly needed topping up due to some hungry Wrigglers. Thank you to Helen at Stockbridge Church who ensured that our hard working audiences were refreshed!
Our colouring competition winner Nancy won a family ticket to one of our shows and we were delighted to meet her on the Tuesday!
After a busy year, and a hectic festival (we both performed elsewhere and attended as many shows as was humanly possible!) we’ve been away on holiday with our families and are ready to start another exciting season of concerts! Time to dust off our instruments and wake up those Wrigglers!
Behind the scenes
It has been a busy month behind the scenes at Recitals for Wrigglers, following the success of our birthday week and leading up to our fringe shows in a few weeks time.
Clea has been volunteering in Croatia at the Balkans Summer Camp, working with children with special needs.
It’s always tricky to fit in rehearsals when we’re both in the same country, let alone when one of us is overseas, and sometimes Skype is the only answer.
We have been researching and arranging music for our new ‘Wriggle Around the World’ programme for our Edinburgh fringe shows (24-29 August). It is always exciting to put together a new programme of music and we have enjoyed finding, writing and arranging some fantastic and interesting new pieces. Even more exciting is that the hugely talented South African percussionist and composer Eugene Skeef has written a piece for us, which arrived last week. It goes without saying that it is brilliant and we can’t wait to rehearse it properly when Clea and I are in the same country! More about the lovely Eugene here;
http://www.eugeneskeef.co.uk/about/page1.html
We have been working closely with Marketing Consultant Emma Walker, Founder and Director of A Stay at Home CEO. She has been busy organising our press releases, along with a million other things that we just don’t have the time, or the the skills, to carry out. She also writes about issues affecting women and the workplace. We probably drive her crazy with our inane questions and artistic brains, but she always deals with things patiently and efficiently with a smile! You can read more about Emma by following this link;
http://astayathomeceo.com/about/
So even with Clea now away in London and me rehearsing with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in Edinburgh this week, we are still well ahead with putting together our programme. All I can say is thank goodness for technology!
Birthday week!
Wow! What an amazing week. We had our first ever concert in Balerno and will definitely return. We also had a new helper, Rhi, on the door who made it possible.
Tuesday took us to Morningside. Great turn out and really nice time relaxing and chatting to mums and wrigglers afterwards.
Wednesday – we were getting good at this programme by now! – South Queensferry. The number of reservations meant that we needed to move into a bigger hall!! Let’s hope we can do that again!
Thursday – off to Cramond. Once again – the numbers were high. We love this venue with it’s colourful beanbags and lovely ‘cafe’ type area for apres gig socialising! The cakes were a big hit here.
Last day of this Birthday run was in Stockbridge Library. 64 adult reservations!! That means at least 64 children! Will need to make enquiries about Murrayfield stadium next! We love this venue and the staff are so helpful. Also our wonderful Kirsten juggled being on the door, looking after Louise’s bairns, taking photos and selling cakes! What would we do without her!
Thank you all for your support! We would welcome any feedback good or bad. We are wondering whether it might be worth doing two sittings – a baby concert and then a toddler one – slightly more tailored to the different age groups. Any thoughts?
Next stop the Edinburgh Fringe 24th August at Stockbridge Church. See you there!!
Clea and Louise
Got an app!!
Feeling smug now I have blog app on my mobile!! Are you ready for my stream of consciousness?!
One small step…
Welcome to our new blog! This is lift-off! Still trying to work out the widgets!
We have been rehearsing for next weeks birthday recitals (we are 1!) As often is the way when we struggle to find a moment – Louise’s wrigglers have ‘helped’ us by listening and wriggling!
More to come soon if this posts ok!!
- ← Previous
- 1
- …
- 4
- 5
