The November 2 SRSNH Gala rehearsal featured a visit by Josh Schreiber Shalem, cellist, viola da gamba player, graduate student at Longy School of Music in Cambridge, Massachusetts, faculty member of the World Fellowship Center’s Early Music Week, co-founder of the Renaissance band Seven Times Salt, and Feldenkrais practitioner. Feldenwhat? Feldenkrais is a method which improves bodily awareness through gentle exercises and is often used by musicians to learn to move efficiently and avoid injury.

Brian Mokler and Betsy Woodman had taken Josh’s workshop in “16th Century Dance Band” and felt his approach would help SRSNH members to “keep the beat.” Among the points he made at our Gala rehearsal: first, learn the music well, so you don’t have to struggle. Then-breathe, think of the phrases and the main beats, not all the little notes in between. Do the controlled breathing he taught us; practice pulsing in your chair; play the music “in your head” while concentrating on the beat; then try the tune live.

After the exercises, we went back to our reel-playing, and sure enough, there was an increased lilt and lift to the music!

Josh sends the following greetings and links to more resources:

“It was a pleasure to work with the band!

The movements we did came from the Feldenkrais Method(r) of Somatic Education. Lots of general information can be found at the Feldenkrais site. There are some interesting articles there about applying Feldenkrais to musicianship.

Anyone who wants to know more about my Feldenkrais teaching can visit my website:

And for my musical endeavors, the best place is at the Seven Times Salt website – early music with a folky sensibility! (Actually, we think we’re a rock band…)

If anyone wants to get occasional emails about either concerts, or Feldenkrais, or the World Fellowship Early Music Week, click here to join my mailing list.

Take good care, and a have a fabulous concert!

~josh

______________________

Josh Schreiber Shalem

Guild Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner

www.discover-yourself.com

josch@rcn.com

781-640-8794

The New Hampshire State Council on the Arts has awarded SRSNH members Sylvia Miskoe and Douglas Brunson a Traditional Arts Apprenticeship grant. This grant enables a master traditional artist, Sylvia, to work with an apprentice, Douglas, for ten months.

Douglas lives in Merrimack, NH, and began playing accordion when he was 8 years old. After he met John Carmichael at the NH Highland Games, his goal was to play ‘like John’. He began taking Scottish accordion lessons with Sylvia in 2007. Apprentices must be 12 years old but the Arts Council waived that rule since Douglas will not be 12 until November.

Sylvia and Douglas will meet weekly to learn the style and background of Scottish tunes, from airs and strathspeys to jigs and reels. At the end of the apprenticeship, Douglas will present a program of Scottish music to a local gathering.

The goal of the traditional arts apprenticeships is to further traditional arts, i.e. music, woodworking, instrument making, and pass the skills on to other artists. The grant provides monies for Douglas’ lessons and for books and CD’s he will use in the learning process. This is the first time a grant has been awarded to an accordionist.

This summer, to help fund our new Website, SRSNH received an Organizational Support Project Grant from the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts (NHSCA). The grant is made possible by appropriations from the Governor and State Legislature and a National Endowment for the Arts grant to the NHSCA. There is tough competition for this money, so the grant is a vote of confidence in the society as a valued member of the New Hampshire arts scene. We’re proud to wear the NHSCA logo on our Website home page.

The SRSNH warmly thanks Governor John Lynch, the New Hampshire Executive Council, and the New Hampshire state legislature for their support of the arts in New Hampshire.