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        Not Pete Atkin >> Off-topic >> Songwriting workshop
        
(Message started by: Simon Reap on Today at 22:19)

Title: Songwriting workshop
Post by Simon Reap on Today at 22:19

Hi all!

A friend of mine runs workshops from her Welsh home (near Tenby). She's run various creative writing and acting courses, but would like to host a songwriting one. The courses are residential and, usually a week or so.

Would any songwriters in the group fancy giving such a course? The structure is not yet defined, but I imagine there'd be a bit of presenting on songwriting, and some workshops.

My friend is an actor, director, writer, and has run a successful theatre company, working mostly in schools, for 25 years. She's also in the middle of a national tour of her one-woman show about the National Trust.

If anyone is interested, I'd be happy to put you in touch with her. I can certainly vouch for her - I've known her, and her husband's Rhythm and Blues band, for 40 years!

All the best,
Simon

Title: Pete Atkin Songwriting Retreat
Post by S J Birkill on 02.02.22 at 23:54

Now here's something a little different:

Further to Simon Reap's note, Pete has decided to take up the implicit suggestion and conduct a residential songwriting workshop, one of a series of courses in the theatre and writing field hosted by actress Helen Wood of the Freshwater Theatre Company, at her rural home in South Wales.

https://www.peteatkin.com/images/Lime_House_with_Helen.jpg (https://www.peteatkin.com/download/Songwriting_Course_promoA4.pdf)
The course will run for six days, from Monday 14th to Saturday 19th of March this year, and the fee, to include accommodation, meals and all tuition, will be £550 per person for a single room, or £500 if sharing a room.

Please note the start date, less than six weeks away. First come will be first accommodated, so if your songwriting is stuck in a rut and you need some group and individual expert coaching, you should consider this retreat right now -- it might be just the opportunity you need.

Full details, including contact information, can be found in this PDF (https://www.peteatkin.com/download/Songwriting_Course_promoA4.pdf).

Steve

Title: Re: Songwriting workshop
Post by Simon Reap on 30.03.22 at 18:09

It's been a week since this retreat. Any news? Did any midvodians go? Enquiring minds are desperate for news :-)

Simon

Title: Re: Songwriting workshop
Post by Pete Atkin on 01.04.22 at 17:37

Well, first of all, Simon, many a primary thank to you for recommending me to Helen Wood, and then more thanks to Helen for agreeing to ask me to tute (is that the word?) the week's course. Helen has run several writing courses and retreats before but this songwriting week was a new venture for her - and for me.

The house a few miles west of Tenby was exceptionally spacious and comfortable and we were all superbly well catered for, in every appropriate sense. It was a small group, which meant that there was plenty of time for one-to-one sessions as well as group workshops, but the talk (and the singing and the playing) didn't flag at all throughout the week, with the result that the TV wasn't turned on once. A couple of members of the group were MVs, but not names that crop up all that often, and I shall leave it to them to decide if they want to identify themselves.

I said at the beginning of the week that I wasn't able to - and wasn't going to try - to show them how I write songs, but that I would do my best to help them solve the particular problems and aspects of writing songs that they had difficulty with: how to get started, how to finish, how to decide what needs changing, etc., etc. In fact the value of a constant readiness to change was a bit of a theme.

It was a sign of how well and how quickly the group acquired mutual trust and confidence that everyone pitched in so willingly and openly. For myself, I came away feeling hugely encouraged and well stocked with additional ideas to try out should I ever be asked to repeat the exercise, and I think everyone else seemed equally positive on their own account. Either that or they were just being exceptionally kind.

But nevertheless, taking absolutely everything into account, the outstanding highlight of the week was unarguably Jill's chocolate cake.

Title: Re: Songwriting workshop
Post by Simon Reap on 10.04.22 at 22:17

Thanks Pete, it all sounded like fun.

I've known Gill for over 30 years, and can confirm that her cakes have always been worth making the effort to consume :-)