Huntingdonshire Music School Association

Well - what a tour! As usual (for these summer tours) it was a hectic combination of sight-seeing, rehearsals, performance and the occasional late night relaxation. Indeed - and again as ever - the weather was brilliant. This was a bit of a worry after the previous tours to France/Germany and Austria which were very hot and sunny. We needn’t have worried as the weather was organised to perfection.

After a very early start at stupid o’clock in the morning (traditional) we sailed from Liverpool on the Seacat ferry. Like a mill pond - don’t know what all the fuss was about. Luckily for those of us with large instruments the hotel was a short walk from the ferry terminal in Douglas and we had Jem and his ‘burger van’ to ferry kit around.

In brief the itinery was:-

• Thurs 24th July. Rehearse. Outing to the Calf of Man and Craig. Performance at the Ballerkermeen High School together with the Isle of Man Wind Orchestra and Manx Saxophone Ensemble
• Friday 25th July. Trip to Peel. BBQ on beach. Rehearse. Concert in Peel Cathedral with the
• Saturday 26th July. Southern Agricultural Show near Castletown. Brass band and Swing Band perform. Return to Douglas on steam train. Take Manx Electric Railway to Laxey. Visit wheel / Snaefell on mountain railway. Farewell meal.
• Sunday 27th July. Performance at Villa Marina Gardens in Douglas. Ferry back ‘across’ and thence back home.

We all had a great time and made many new friends whilst over there. This was only possible with a lot of hard work, both here at home and also those in the Isle of Man - not just ex-HUMS-pats like Jem (& family) but also the Manx Sax Ensemble and luminaries like Paul Dunderdale and the Isle of Man Arts Council, Ballerkermeen High School and many, many more.

These trips are now very much part of the annual calendar for the music school and are organised by HUMSA for the benefit of everyone. They are very social affairs and good opportunities to get to know others who you may know by sight across the school or even orchestra or band but never have the time to speak to (yes, it is really that busy on Saturday mornings!).

Next year (2009) we’re off to Norfolk.

This week, on March 10th, Len Davidson - who continues to teach electric guitar at the Huntingdonshire Music School - was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at the Waldorf Astoria in New York with the other members of the Dave Clarke Five.

There is a good video of the award made by Tom Hanks to the group on YouTube.

Len was in good company at the award ceremony with other inductees being Madonna, Leonard Cohen and Mellencamp. Artists first become eligible 25 years after their first release.

Len also plays a mean classical and sometimes electric/acoustic guitar with the Cambridge Guitar Orchestra (not the only teacher from the music school who plays with the CGO).

Other links

• story on Reuters
• Dave Clarke Five - Tribute on YouTube
• Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum

Introduction

Here we provide some help for those who’d like to receive our ‘HUMS Aloud’ podcast.

First, to inject a little bit of sanity:-

• you don’t need to own an iPod or similar Mp3 player in order to listen
 
• you do need a computer!
• when we use the word ‘subscribe’ all we mean issetting up the software on your computer to automatically check for new episodes. If it finds news ones it will then automatically download them for you to listen to when you choose to

What Do I Need?

In order to listen to our podcast you need:-

 
• a computer. It doesn’t matter whether it runs Microsoft Windows or the Apple Mac OS X operating systems or indeed Linux
 
• a software application that can check for new episodes and download them

Having the patience of a saint or a brain the size of a planet isn’t a necessary requirement, luckily!

How Do I Go About Getting the Podcast?

The following steps are written specifically for use of Apple’s iTunes software (Mac and Windows versions are identical). If you use another piece of software the basic principles should still apply.

 
• Get the software and install it. The iTunes software is available free of charge from Apple - click here to go to their site.
• Install iTunes software that you just downloaded.
 
• Run/open the iTunes software application.
 
• Select the ‘Podcast’ item in the left hand pane

• On the top menu bar, look for ‘Advanced’ and select ‘Subscribe to Podcast’

 
• in the window that appears, enter the address of our HUMS Aloud podcast - http://www.btpodshow.com/feeds/humsaloud.xml

 
• click on ‘OK’. You should then see the HUMS Aloud podcast appear in the list of podcasts

That’s all there is to it. iTunes will check from time to time and download new episodes without you having to do anything.

Further Reference

If you want to find other podcasts you can either select ‘iTunes Store’ within iTunes and then ‘Podcasts’ on the page that loads

or you can visit Podcast Alley and browse.