Angelina Egerton

Freelancers’ Guilt, and what we can do about it.

17 October 2013 No Comments

This week’s post is addressing something I think a lot of freelancers feel. That is the guilty feeling hanging over us, telling us we’re not doing enough, should do more.

I hate the word should, I should get up earlier, I should be doing this or that, I shouldn’t go out because I should be being productive, eugh, it’s awful. It SHOULD be banned from our internal monologue (I know we all have one).

I have some theories as to why we feel this (I’m assuming I’m not the only one). Here they are:

We often work from home, so there is little work/home separation.

There are no immediate negative consequences for getting up late/having an unproductive day.

Obviously long term there are consequences for lack of productivity – but there is a time delay – we pay for laziness later in ways we often can’t predict.

There is never a point that we can say ‘I have finished everything I have to do!’ There is an infinite amount to be done, freelancers are never finished, sometimes it can feel like a huge mountain to climb each day.

If there is nothing set in the diary, it’s easy to feel we can start later and before we know it, the day has gone.

With constant interruptions from phone calls/emails/technology/social media – it’s very easy to get distracted and not realise how much time is passing.

What can we do about this? Now I’m no expert, I only graduated a couple of years ago but I’m learning a few tricks that help my productivity immensely. This is obviously written from the perspective of a musician. These tips may work for you or they may not, but when it’s really important that I get as much as I can done, here’s what I do:

Write a schedule for the day, the night before. Begin by listing everything that needs doing (I include things like ‘pay electicity bill’ and ‘laundry’ as well as ’emails’, and ‘admin’). Decide when to get up and what is going to be done each hour. For musicians – don’t just write ‘Practice’ actually write what is going to be practised, be specific. This helps because if you have scheduled 3 hours for practice, it doesn’t seem to matter so much if you miss one. But, if each session has a specific purpose, you’re more likely to get it done, as it might be the only chance you get that day to look at that certain piece/section/excerpt.
Set an alarm and put it far away from your bed! This helps so much I’d actually say it’s the most effective way to increase productivity. When the alarm is right next to the bed, it is too easy to snooze, then before you know it hours have passed and you’re still in bed. Great. This has another advantage as well, for most of us, our smartphone is our alarm – by placing it on the other side of the room it means we don’t google/facebook/tweet away half the night and can actually get to sleep a lot quicker. I am a real sleepaholic (sleepophile?) so this one is difficult for me but it is so worth it!
Actually stick to your schedule. Hopefully you’ve made it realistic and given yourself plenty of time to do what you wanted to. Tick things off as you do them, and if you get ahead of schedule – great! Time to chill later. I generally do mine in hour blocks but half an hour can work too.
(This may be controversial) Keep your phone on ‘Do Not Disturb’ during working hours and set a time in your schedule to ring/text people back or listen to voicemails (put your email address in your voicemail greeting so people have another way of contacting you). This also has the added bonus of stopping your phone going off every time something happens on Facebook – a potentially huge time-sap. If you need to – schedule an hour at the end of the day purely for social media – particularly for freelancers who are trying to build an online presence.
Try and get up at the same time each weekday. For those of us who work from home (can be a blessing or a curse) it’s good to have a routine. For example, you could get up at 8am every weekday, 9am on Saturdays and whenever you fancy on a Sunday… that way the weekend still feels like the weekend rather than each day feeling exactly the same.
If you can work somewhere else, do. It is one of my dreams to have a separate bedroom, office and music room. Three rooms. Or maybe even an out-house where I can go specifically to do admin or practice. Unfortunately this is the real world and I live in a small flat. My bedroom has my harp and all my music in one corner and my desk and laptop in another. It takes self-discipline to go to one zone and not get distracted when everything is just there – being all distracting. You just sit down to practice but oh! laundry needs doing, ooh so does this morning’s washing up – ahh while I’m here I may as well tidy the kitchen… you can lose days like this so we must be strong and do one thing at a time. Schedule a time for housework and do it later.

*My mum will be reading this and realise that I am in fact, turning into my father – I’m so sorry*

So these are the things I try to do, but I also try and remember the following:

Nobody is perfect. We’re all just trying to make a living. Let’s all just do the best we can, get stuff done then get on with enjoying ourselves. None of this ‘should’ nonsense. No more guilt. You Only Live Once.
Mealtimes are rest times – no emails/phone calls during mealtimes. It seems like ages but I always try to give myself an hour for each meal – it spreads the day out and gives time to prepare something vaguely healthy.
All hail wondrous coffee – there’s nothing like it to regain focus if you’re flagging mid-afternoon – or just struggling to wake up mid-morning. I bought my first coffee machine a few weeks ago and have been more or less wired ever since.

So there we have it – freelancers, how do you increase/maintain productivity? Please share tips & tricks in the comments!

Career, Music

Video from Festival Number 6

11 October 2013 No Comments

Here is a video of Cathal Mo Chroi with the Festival Number Six Ensemble under Joe Duddell. Lovely people and a pleasure to perform with.

Career, Music

Festival No. 6 2013

3 October 2013 2 Comments

Between the 12th and 15th September I was in Portmeirion playing for Festival Number Six. This was a real experience and, considering I hesitated a little when originally asked to do it – I’m so glad I did.

The first day was chaos. There’s no other way to describe it. I thought I’d be clever and set off super early to allow for ‘getting lost’ time once we’d arrived. I was giving a lift to horn player Joel Roberts – hi Joel! – and we set off around 8am. The postcode we’d been sent to was an empty business park (later we realised it was only empty because we were so wonderfully early) – so we drove on to the main festival site – which I later realised I wasn’t allowed to drive on to … naughty me.

Anyway, fast forward about an hour of wondering if we’re in the right place we’d managed to find the Cassia String Quartet, fresh from driving up from the South of France, as well as our artist wristbands:

After being given wristbands I was told there was no way I was getting my car on to the Festival site to drop off the harp. Just no way. They offered to take it by golf buggy – I politely declined. I ended up having to put my harp into a Volvo four by four. I couldn’t believe it fit! The driver of the Volvo – Sid – was lovely and said they were there to give lifts to the artists when we needed them. I think he somewhat underestimated how busy they were going to be over the next few days as I was only able to use a Volvo at the beginning and the end of the Festival.

I left my car on the football field in the photo above – unfortunately due to the crazy weather this field turned into a muddy mess – it took me ages to get my car off the mud and onto the safety of an actual road. Getting off the field involved taking a ‘run up’ to the curb in order to get up the muddy slope and onto tarmac. There were three Welsh car park attendants egging me on telling me to go faster – I was so not in the mood for that.

My harp’s home for the next few days was the Town Hall. It wasn’t until later that evening that we (the ensemble) found our home for the weekend. ‘Artist Camping’ – when we eventually found it, was about 15 minutes walk from the main village, and completely devoid of showers/toilets. Not to be deterred though, we set up our tents in some sort of circle – some quicker than others. Joel had the unpleasant experience of a drunk festival-goer tumbling into his tent in the middle of the night, who somehow managed to crawl in between the inner and outer part of the tent… how? I have no idea.

So the camping part of the trip was cold. I won’t lie. It was cold, windy and damp, but I had my inflatable mattress and memory foam pillow, as well as lots of layers for the night. We’re talking strappy top, t-shirt, long-sleeved top, hoody AND blanket as well as sleeping bag. The weather got progressively worse as the weekend went on (Saturday – lovely then rain, Sunday – rain and so windy I saw three tents blow away).

The playing part of the weekend was great. The Cassia Quartet, formed of Amy, Tori, Laurie and Josh, as well as horn player Joel and percussionists Delia and Graham, along with myself we formed the Festival Number 6 Ensemble directed by Joe Duddell:

The ensemble was to accompany a few different acts during the festival. Daughter, Jackie Oates, and Cathal Mo Chroi (aka Chas Smash from Madness).

Working with Cathal was certainly fun. He did a set of six songs: Love Songs No. 9 and 7, A Comfortable Man, Do you Believe in Love? Goodbye Planet Earth, and The Wren’s Burial. The harp was needed for everything, yay! There’s also a youtube video of my favourite, which can be found here.

I remember during one of the breaks, Cathal met up with us in the cafe and showed us some poetry he’d written and recorded – very amusing and well written (and naughtily rude). The overall vibe I got from working with Cathal is that he’s very chilled out, and definitely doesn’t take himself too seriously. It’s so nice when the people you’re playing for actually make the effort to hang out and talk to you backstage. It doesn’t happen all that often.

Playing with Daughter was amazing as well – not only were they incredibly professional, punctual and efficient in setting up all their equipment – they also had a pleasing attention to detail in rehearsals. As well as that, they are absolutely lovely people, a real pleasure to work with.

The Daughter gig was on the Saturday night, which was followed by some drinks and dancing – loads of fun. On Sunday the weather turned really nasty. I was so worried my tent was going to blow away – I actually saw several tents blow over in the wind. It turned out that I wasn’t actually needed for any rehearsals or sets that day so I set about trying to take down the tent and pack all my things. By some miracle I was allowed to bring my car back on to the festival site to pick up my harp. Hurray!

On returning to Manchester, I had a new-found appreciation for lots of little things: getting dressed standing up for example, rather than awkwardly lying down in a confined space. The first night back in my bed was amazing! I think my harp was very happy to be back – I’d booking it in for a service the following day as a much needed treat.

So, lots of good things from the Festival, fun music, lovely people in the bands and the ensemble – but the weather could have been better/less muddy. Definitely an experience I’ll remember.

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The show(s) must go on.

27 August 2013 1 Comment

I am writing this from my home for the week in Newcastle. This week I’m playing for the Newcastle Musical Theatre Company’s production of Sound of Music in Newcastle’s Theatre Royal. The first performance is tonight, which is very exciting! Here’s my harp in the pit:

I left my pillar cover on just to be on the safe side… the ceiling is really low! This is probably the easiest pit I’ve been in recently. This month I’ve also been playing with the National Festival Orchestra for the International Gilbert & Sullivan Festival in Buxton Opera House, which is beautiful:

The technical team in Buxton move harps all the time (or so they told me) and thought it best to lower my harp down into the pit from the stage. Oh my. It was crazy – but actually – if you have enough people helping it’s not too bad. Here’s my view from the pit once I was in:

I was there to play in Franz Lehar’s Merry Widow. What a fun operetta! It’s still going round in my head most of the time. The performances were separated by a day, and instead of being able to leave my harp in the pit I had to heave it out to go up to Scarborough to take part in a concert organised by the lovely Christine Cox, playing alongside Simon Lindley, Keith Swallow and Phillip McCann. It was lovely to do some solo performing:

After Buxton, Merry Widow was also performed in Harrogate’s Royal Hall – the pit was even more tricky than Buxton! The harp had to be lifted over a waist-level rail before being lowered into the pit – thankfully again I had loads of people helping me (by helping me I actually mean doing it all themselves while I try not to freak out too much). And I couldn’t even leave the harp there because in between performances I had to drive up to Newcastle for the first Sound of Music bandcall! Yes this week has been mental. I enjoy playing for shows so much though it’s worth all the driving, no question.

So here I am, in Newcastle for the week. I thought I was being sensible by buying lots of healthy food to cook for myself (I’m staying in university halls of residence) but I didn’t realise that the kitchen is devoid of any pans/pots/cutlery! I think some band members are donating stuff to me for the week, but tonight I’m afraid I’m having garlic bread and pizza, shove in the oven and eat. As simple as you can get!

So that pretty much brings us up to date. As ever, thanks for reading! Lots of exciting projects coming up in the near future! I can’t wait to tell you all about them.

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Lovely CLOUDS review

16 August 2013 No Comments

As part of the CLOUDS tour that happened a few weeks ago, we did a concert in Eastgate Theatre in Peebles. This concert received a wonderful review and we are all really proud. I wanted to share this with you…

‘CLOUDS ARE STARS!

A feeling of expectation fills the darkened room, lit by tiny flickering candle flames. A young woman floats in, the candle in her cupped hands lighting the folds of her many coloured silks. She asks us to go with the stars to the furthest cosmos and, like a butterfly, flutters down behind one of four huge harps, where her fingers pluck out a tinkling ostinato. She is joined by three more beautiful silk butterflies and the four harps blend the magical sounds of ‘Interstellar Clouds’, transporting us all to stars beyond imagination.

It is two years since I heard a concert by Clouds Harp Quartet. Then their music delighted, intrigued and moved me. I looked forward to hearing more. The four harpists, Elfair Dyer, Rebecca Mills, Esther Swift and Angelina Warburton, have grown up and developed with their music. They have been together for four years and have built a strong ensemble in which the chemistry between then is almost visible. They give more than a concert. It is a complete performance, the music enhanced by subtle lighting, costumes, props and seamless introductions with charm to draw us into the magical musical world of Clouds. These four lovely girls still look absurdly young, which belies their assured adult musicianship – for it is not simple music that they play.

Peebles’ own Esther Swift has composed much of the music, which makes use of the many voices of the concert harp – not all of them familiar or traditional. The extended technique uses plucking strings with fingers, finger tips or nails; glissandos; harmonics; sliding and striking the strings; tapping or banging the soundboard; even slipping card or metal inserts behind the strings. One harp creeps in with an insistent ostinato, which grows until all four harps play as one, the give and take of rhythm building sound and mood. The regularity of the ostinato lulls us into a false sense of security to be shattered by a sudden intense volume of sound – hands urgently slapping strings and soundboard. It is exciting, strong and dramatic. Esther’s music is not just pretty tinkling harp strings – from tiny, almost inaudible
sounds to huge crescendos; lilting folky rhythms to jagged syncopation – she makes the 188 harp strings speak and sing…

‘Interstellar Clouds’ was composed by Esther and it was excellent to have another chance to hear her ‘Clouds’ inspired by a walk up the Sware and her father’s poem about the clouds.

And whose mother would not be delighted with a Mothers’ Day gift of an original composition – a song for voice and harp? Deeply moving.

The main work performed was Esther’s latest composition ‘Water’, which took us from
the single raindrop that starts a river, through a delicate snowstorm to the ocean. From the rippling burn to the strong river currents the music really sounded wet, climaxing in the strong and aggressive pull of the moon on the high tide. Finally, as earth and water come together, all four players left their harps to sing softly in harmony close to their rapt audience. It was an unforgettable musical journey full of colour, drama and mood swings.

Throughout the concert we shared the fun and joy that the players obviously get from their wonderful instruments. A quartet of concert harps is unusual (and must be a logistical challenge!) but this girl band really is something special, as many will discover on this tour.’

Claire Garnett – thank you so much for this wonderful review!

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CLOUDS and beyond

9 August 2013 1 Comment

So I ended the previous post saying I was going to be driving up to Edinburgh after the final Les Mis show a week last Saturday. What I hadn’t bargained on was the weather. After glorious sunshine for what felt like ages, that Saturday afternoon the rain started. While packing for the CLOUDS tour I even wondered if I should bother packing jeans or just stick to summer dresses as I had been doing. So glad I packed jeans!

Elfair and I left Runcorn at around 11pm for Edinburgh. The rain was constant and very heavy – we arrived sometime around 5.30am. I have little memory of actually arriving, the concentration required for driving in the pouring rain had completely drained me. But we had a sleep in the following day to recharge our batteries. That evening we had a concert in Canongate Kirk in Edinburgh.

It was such a beautiful space, really blue! They keep the front pew roped off as that’s where the Queen sits when she visits (sadly she decided not to attend our concert). The following lunchtime we played in Edinburgh’s St. Giles Cathedral. We love playing here, there were so many tourists coming in and out all the time but lots of them sat down to listen to us (we also sold lots of CDs!)

After St. Giles it was time to drive down to Peebles in the Scottish Borders for an evening concert the following day at the Eastgate Theatre. It was here that we had the idea to start the concert in complete darkness. We go to the harps and start playing one by one, each holding a candle. Our first piece is entitled ‘Interstellar Cloud’ so the candles look like twinkling stars as we play. It’s also the bonus track on our new CD – WATER which can be purchased here http://www.cloudsandharps.bigcartel.com/product/water

Here we are at Eastgate:

We had lots of people commenting on our dresses, Rebecca (on the left in the photo) actually got these for us while working on the Queen Elizabeth cruiseship. Two are from Costa Rica, one is from Malaysia and the other is from Mexico! We loved how coordinated they are while still being individual.

After Peebles it was time to head down to Newcastle for a Wednesday evening concert in Trinity Church – another beautiful venue, followed by a Thursday lunchtime concert in Brunswick Church right in the city centre.

The rest of the day was spent driving down to Mynytho in North Wales. I adore this area and luckily the weather was fabulous when we were there – there was even chance to paddle in the sea in Abersoch!

We had an evening concert on Friday in Pwllheli (a concert that included lots of delicious cake in the interval!) followed by an afternoon concert on the Saturday in Llanbedrog at the Art Gallery. This was a really special concert as we played outside in their little amphitheatre! I’m sure you can imagine that the value of our harps means that conditions have to be perfect, but on that day we had the chance to play CLOUDS under the clouds!

On the Sunday we all went our separate ways, I headed back to Manchester, Esther set off for London, Elfair went to compete in the Eisteddfod and Rebecca went to support – Elfair actually won the Blue Riband so a huge well done to her for that! What a way to end the week.

So it’s been nearly a week since the tour ended and it’s back to reality – this is the first ‘free’ week I’ve had since I left Long Tall Sally. There’s still lots to keep me busy though! It’s amazing to not have to set an alarm for the morning, but it is rather alarming that my body wants to sleep until 11am some days! Need to get some sort of schedule going – maybe next week!

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CLOUDS, Les Mis and Summer

25 July 2013 3 Comments

Summer 2013 is turning out to be very busy indeed!

Last week was the first leg of the CLOUDS Harp Quartet tour. We did five concerts in and around Manchester and had a great time, rehearsals were at my flat, rather interesting fitting four pedal harps into an average-sized lounge:

The tour is to promote our new CD entitled WATER:

We are all so excited about this new piece. It’s written by Esther Swift – but I use the term loosely – nothing is physically written down. Esther composes the piece, then teaches it to us aurally and by demonstration. When we first started playing together about four years ago I’d never done anything like it, but now I love it. The music is so free because we aren’t bound by sheets of music, we have to communicate a lot during our performances and I think it makes us much tighter as a group.

*At this point I’d just like to say anyone wishing to purchase WATER can do so by clicking here http://www.cloudsandharps.bigcartel.com/product/water *

Also, here are the dates for our 2013 tour – catch us in Edinburgh, Peebles, Newcastle or North Wales:

On the first day of rehearsals with CLOUDS, my new lever harp arrived! I’ve hired one for the year, and it arrived like this:

It’s a Dusty Strings Ravenna 34 and so far I’m really happy with it – I even went busking earlier this week! I hadn’t really realised how heavy these things are, yes it’s easier than a pedal harp but too much walking around with this on my shoulder results in a lot of pain. Definitely an interesting experience though.

So this week I’m playing for Les Miserables over in Runcorn. Same company that I played for when they did Phantom of the Opera last year. It’s a group of 16-19 year olds and it’s in The Brindley in Runcorn. I do love playing for shows and I’m lucky enough to be doing three this Summer, this one is a bit different though because I’m playing from the guitar part. Shaun Chambers, the conductor, thought (quite rightly) that some of the melody parts would sound really good on the harp – however, it also means I have to play from guitar notation eek! It has been so good for me though, playing from chord symbols – a bit time consuming to mark up in terms of pedals but once you get used to it it’s nice having the flexibility to slightly change what you play each time. Usually playing harp for a show you can expect to be in five or six numbers. I’m playing ALL THE TIME – it’s great! Although it doesn’t leave enough time to eat my minstrels during the show. I made friends with the brass players during the interval last night over chocolates and warm lager. Classy.

The final show is this Saturday evening, after which I am driving straight up to Edinburgh to start the second part of the CLOUDS tour. Someone remind me how I ever managed to fit in a day job?!

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Both sides of the coin.

1 July 2013 1 Comment

Well again it’s been too long since I’ve posted, but I can promise that from now I’ll be blogging much more regularly because…

I QUIT MY JOB!

That’s right, I’m giving up regular income and easy work to become essentially a wandering minstrel.

I have three shifts left – I actually cried when I handed my notice in, but I know it’s for the best. Saturday is my last one, it’s going to be weird. Long Tall Sally has taken up so much of the last 6 months it’ll be very strange having time to do other things.

The fact is, it is too hard to fit my musical life into 3 days a week. I’ve tried, and I can’t do it. Yes I can do my Saturday gigs but I never have time to practice (I actually miss practice – what’s happened to me?!) My flat is always a mess because I never have time nor energy to clean and tidy, my repertoire is dwindling as I don’t have time to learn new pieces and I’m way behind on general life admin (sorry to my parents who still have my deceased car on the driveway seven months after I get a new one!)

Yes, the income was OK, the girls I work with are lovely and I feel very lucky in that respect. But, I didn’t study for four years for a music degree and undertake years of practice and hard work just to spend my days manning a shop floor for minimum wage.

So here’s the plan:

1. Summer is pretty booked up with gigs so income should be ok for a while.

2. Hire a lever harp and try busking to see if it’s a realistic source of extra income. If it does turn out to be good money, try lots of different cities/save up to purchase the harp. Maybe even drive to France and do some busking on the continent?!

3. Keep any spending to a MINIMUM – essentials only – bye bye gym membership, clothes from Primark and food from Aldi – get a cheaper sim-only contract when my current contract runs out AND my car insurance should be a lot cheaper when I renew.

4. Write to all the cruise companies I can google and try to drum up some work.

5. Chop up credit card (I actually already did this)

So I named this post ‘both sides of the coin’. Before I got my job at LTS, I needed income – desperately. When I got the job, I realised I’d actually given up the freedom that comes with being freelance – and the price I had put on my freedom was a little over £6 an hour. I can now see that having the ability to work for myself and to rely only upon myself is worth so much more than that. Yes it’s risky and scary, but I remember at RNCM in one harp class with our teacher – Eira – we discussed the poem by William Arthur Ward ‘To Risk’ and in particular the line the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. I simply have to be free to sort my own schedule, to come and go as I please and not have to ask anyone’s permission before taking on work that is good for my career.

But, I honestly think, having seen and experienced a ‘normal job’ for the past six months, I am more motivated than ever to take my music career as far as I possibly can. This has been a real wake up call and shown me that it is my passion – and the only thing I can really see myself being happy spending my life doing.

To Risk by William Arthur Ward

To laugh is to risk appearing a fool,

To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.

To reach out to another is to risk involvement,

To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self.

To place your ideas and dreams before a crowd is to risk their loss.

To love is to risk not being loved in return,

To live is to risk dying,

To hope is to risk despair,

To try is to risk failure.

But risks must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.

The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing.

He may avoid suffering and sorrow,

But he cannot learn, feel, change, grow or live.

Chained by his servitude he is a slave who has forfeited all freedom.

Only a person who risks is free.

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Back after a break!

10 June 2013 2 Comments

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything here. I have been insanely busy. I knew this would happen – I’d get a job and lose all my spare time trying to juggle everything.

The income is great though, I’ve been on holiday with some lovely friends to Cyprus for ten days. I’m starting to slowly climb out of debt (the pace of the climb has increased since the holiday) and there is light at the end of the tunnel!

What I’m focussing on now is the fact that I reallllly really want to do some travelling – or at least live abroad for a while. Playing on the ship in Southampton that went nowhere has made me desperately want to play on a ship that does in fact travel with me on it. I’m also chasing the possibility of doing some sort of residency in a luxury hotel in Dubai – the money would be great and the lifestyle would be fabulous.

So I work in the shop four days a week, that means I have to squeeze the rest of my life into three days (plus evenings when I’m not in the gym/too tired to function). It is so challenging – and this Summer is going to be busy. I’m playing for Les Miserables in Runcorn, The Sound of Music in Newcastle, various weddings, as well as a tour with my wonderful harp quartet CLOUDS (more about that to follow in a separate post).

Juggling work + music is going to be very tricky for the next few months, but I daren’t hand my notice in because September, October and November are looking pretty shocking gig-wise at this stage. I’m waiting for an email/phone call regarding a cruise or an international residency sometime in the next few weeks, until then I’m going to try and not act rashly. Keep up with life admin (letters, emails, staying organised), practice (for gigs as well as various concerts and recitals coming up) as well as working in Long Tall Sally.

Main challenge will be to hang on to my sanity. It’s not going well.

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April 18th

18 April 2013 2 Comments

Last week I spent five days aboard the Saga Sapphire in Southampton:

While docked, it acted as a hotel, allowing passengers to experience what Saga have to offer. I was booked to play for them, but I had no idea what would be expected when I got down there.

I gave a lift to the trombone player in the band – Matt – and we set off from Manchester at just after 5am on Wednesday. We arrived pretty much bang on time but had to wait a while before boarding. I got numerous comments of ‘don’t you wish you’d played the violin?’. One day I swear, someone will say that and I will respond ‘wow, YES! Why did I not think of that before, here, take my harp, I’m leaving to find a better life!’

Basically, I had no idea what was going on, how long I would be playing each day, where I’d be staying (i.e. in a ‘crew’ room or a ‘guest’ room) or where I’d be eating. Once on board I was told the lifts weren’t working and I was to take my harp to the 8th deck (are you KIDDING?!) they sent me down to 4th deck to find my cabin, only there was a man in there watching telly, so I trundled back up to reception and asked for another room. They gave me this lovely room on 8th deck:

Not sure why I got a twin room but at least my bags had somewhere to sleep. The weird thing about it was, as it was an inside room (no windows) you can turn off the lights at any point during the day and it feels like night time! Ideal napping territory.

I was told that I was to eat in the restaurant, with the guests, and oh my, the food was divine. Wine was included with dinner (dangerous):

The steak was also to die for, I had chocolate cake, lots of chocolate cake every day and it was amazing. And yes, I may have gained a little weight while I was there but I was having such a lovely time it didn’t matter!

So my job on the ship was to play background music while the guests were having afternoon tea. Every day we had different guests and every day they were really receptive and I got lots of applause (rare for background music) and I was also thanked by the Cruise Director several times, which was lovely. So I would play for an hour, have some coffee and pastries, then play for another hour, have some cakes, then play for the last 45 minutes or so. Dream job? Yes. Here’s my harp on stage:

In the evenings, from around 6.30, there was a cocktail party in the lounge where champagne was on tap – uh oh – and the guests were welcomed by the Captain and the Cruise Director. Dinner was after that (did I mention the amazing steak?) Then at 9.30pm Steve Terry would sing his Cabaret set, Bobby Darin, Michael Buble, things like that, I loved it! At around 10.30pm the dance troupe would start their Mo-town show, all singing, all dancing – I saw this maybe twice or three times while I was there and really enjoyed it, then at 11pm the UpBeat Beatles started playing and everyone danced. They finished around midnight, when I would go up and listen to the cocktail pianist/piano entertainer Martin Orbidans play until around 1.30am. Any song you can think of, he knows – he even managed to get me behind the microphone singing Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man – I was having a great time and no one walked out, amazing! On the last night I managed to get a photo with Steve and Martin so here we are:

So the evenings were pretty full, in the mornings I was either sleeping, or having a swim in the spa on the second deck, which I pretty much had to myself…

So yea, had a lovely few days and didn’t want to return to normal life really – I wanted to stay on the Sapphire and sail to the Med! Never mind, I would jump at the chance to do some more work for them. It’s also got me thinking how much I’d love to travel and play – I’m discussing the possibility of going out to somewhere in the Middle East/Asia to play in a luxury hotel for 3-6 months. I mean, it sounds too good to be true, all food/accommodation/flights/visas paid, I would get to stay in a swanky hotel and play every day – and I would earn good money doing it – more than I make now, working every day either in the shop or teaching or gigs. I’m seriously thinking about it. I turned it down last year, don’t think I’m going to be turning it down this time. Watch this space!

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