UPDATE – 01-10-15

Hello all you lovely Queen Ethelburga’s students, and welcome to the band! You are now part of Hope and Social, and we’re together all day this Tuesday the 3rd November, to make a show to be performed in the evening in the Kings Theatre! So, presuming you’re reading this on the Monday you get back to QE… tomorrow, we get to put on a show and play (amongst other things) a song that has been performed by over 5,000 people, and beamed to the TVs of millions of people across the world.

Tuesday will be lots of fun. It’ll be hard work too (seeing as we’re pulling a show together in the course of just one day!!!), but we’ll have a good time. Promise! And remember you’re in safe hands. We’ve done this before. We’re there to make you look, and sound great. We’re very excited… and we hope you are too!
With that in mind, here’s what you need to know. There’s quite a lot of info here, but we’ll try and keep it interesting, so please do read it all!

We’re all learning three songs, so without further ado, this is how the day’ll break up. >>

1) Schedule for the day
9:00 – come to the theatre! We’ll get to meet and say howdy you everyone, and then we’re going to play you a song or two.
9:45 – we’ll start to split into our groups, and get ready to learn your first song
10:00 – Learn 1st song
11:15 – break
11:30 – Learn 2nd song
12:45 – Lunch. We like lunch. Food fuels fun!
13:45 – Learn 3rd song
15:00 – break (move back to the theatre)
15:20 – In our 4th session, we’ll start to pull the show together.
17:00 – That’s all our prep done! Time for tea!
18:30 – Doors
19:00 -Showtime!

2) Dress Code:
We’re musicians now… so school uniform just ain’t gonna cut it this Tuesday. For the sessions during the day, wear something comfortable. For the evening, well let’s cover all bases. Bring your uniform for the show, but also, if you’re able to wear royal blue and white, well, they’re our colours. Bring something blue and white to wear… if you’ve got blue jeans and a white T-shirt… we’re cookin’!

3) What to bring:
If you play a carryable instrument (woodwind/brass/guitars etc), bring your instrument, all appropriate leads, a music stand or whatever you need to perform to the theatre. If you’re a pianist, we’ll be working on keyboards. We’ll sort that out on Tuesday. Likewise if you’re a drummer, likewise. Don’t bring a whole drumkit to the theatre please. [grins]

If you put yourself down as “Sings” or “Likes to Sing”, you’re in the choir. Bring your voice pleeeease!

Here’s how the songs break down. Click the liks to have a listen and to start familiarising yourself with the tunes. You can stream them from here, or download them to your computer… all free!

4) Songs:
We’re ALL playing The Big Wide

and Pitching Far Too High

Instrumentalists (brass, woodwind/strings)
Marching On Through

aaaaand By The Morning Dew

Guitars
Rolling Sideways

A Darkness Now Is Coming

(guitarists, if you want to get a head start, the music for you is here!)

Drums
Marching On Through

Back to the Green

Piano and Keyboards
All Our Dancing Days

Eurospin

Singers/Choir
Rolling Sideways

One Way Home

Lastly…
So, you’re part of the band now, and one of the most important aspects of being in a band is pulling a crowd. Your final task between now and the show is to promote the show, ask your friends, parents, guardians. Tell the people in your class… tell everyone you think might be interested in a really great concert, but tell people about it! Tickets are available here.

Sooooo, there you have it. Have a listen, get the songs in your heads, and we’ll run the songs with you all day. Reeeeeeeally looking forward to seeing you all bright and breezy on Tuesday. Let’s make it AWESOME!
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The rest of this page is the information Rich gave you when he came in to do the assembly with you, if you’ve not read it before… or need a refresher, read on! See you Tuesday!

END UPDATE – 01-10-15

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Ever wanted to be in a band? Make a great noise with professional musicians? Want to look and sound cooler than all your friends? Well this is your chance!

Hi all!!!!!

Welcome, welcome, welcome. We are Hope & Social, a band from West Yorkshire who, as well as doing proper bandy things like playing gigs and recording music, like to take on seemingly impossible projects and make them into strange realities. Over the years we’ve done all sorts, from turning our studio into a French bistro, to taking a bunch of lovely people to the beach on an open top bus.

We’re a band who like to involve people in what we do, whether it’s a 2,500 strong kazoo section at Glastonbury, teaching 1,500 people across Yorkshire how to play our songs and playing 12 gigs in four days to celebrate that, or performing to 300 million people on the telly-bobs at the opening ceremony of the Tour de France: Grand Depart…

Aaaaaand we’re bringing our show to QE!

So……what is ‘A Band Anyone Can Join’?

On the 3rd of November this year, Hope and Social bring their “A Band Anyone Can Join” project to QE.

For one day, you can be part of our band, learn our songs, and do a show with us in the evening to our/your adoring public!

“Looks amazing!!” we hear you say. “Thanks!” we reply. ) “How can I get involved in ABACJ??

Another good question (and nice use of the acronym). If you play an instrument or sing, please contact Ms Woodward at lw@qe.org and she will start working out how we can fit you in. Just make sure you let her know the following:
a) Name
b) Form
c) Instrument
d) Grade (or if you don’t do grades, tell us about what it is that you do. How experienced are you? Can you play F on a guitar?)

Now, it will mean one full day out of lessons, so sorry about that, but if you’re happy to forgo a day of academic education for a day of musical education [grins] then please, sign up, come say howdy and we’ll look forward to seeing you on the 3rd Nov!

Please note, there is LIMITED AVAILABILITY this time… but we will be back – so if we can’t get you involved this time, worry not. We’re not ignoring you.

I think that’s all you really need to know for now. Feel free to browse around our site, have a look at some of our videos, listen to some of our music (it’s Pay What You Want, including FREE, so get stuck in!) and get yourself generally acquainted with what we do.

Very much looking forward to seeing you all on the 3rd Nov

Ta

H&S