By Amy Crampton
Unless you are not on Facebook, you will be fully aware that the Belles are putting on a concert in Selby Abbey on 17th September.
The music team decided it would be a good opportunity to get some outside coaching in to help put some spit and polish on our repertoire. So, we invited the formidable Emma Shanks to join us for three Tuesdays in August.
Across the three weeks we worked on the repertoire for the concert and Emma gave us some amazing techniques to use that helped us use our instruments (our bodies) better. We worked on breathing, the meaning of the songs, using action words to help us get the meaning across, posture, free weeing (I wonder why that stuck in our minds!) and so much more...
Emma has such a positive nature that it is catching. She helped us to really build our confidence with the songs and also in the sound we were making. She wasn't even put off when she heard Fever! Emma showed us what each technique did to the sound by singing both using and not using a technique which really helped us to understand why we were being asked to sing in a particular way.
It isn’t easy having coaching on a Tuesday night. We have all had the busyness of normal life on Tuesday, either working, looking after the kids/grandchildren, or for some just the luxury of retired life! However Emma’s natural enthusiasm helped us keep energised across the night and meant that it was a shock to reach 10pm!
Thank you so much for coming to coach us Emma! We really appreciate it and are already looking forward to seeing you again soon.
If you haven't had Emma as a coach, we can thoroughly recommend her!