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The ultimate guide to booking a harpist for your wedding.

9 April 2015 4 Comments

So you’re getting married? Congratulations! You’d like a harpist to play for your wedding? You obviously have excellent taste. I thought I’d write this guide for happy couples to try to answer some of the questions I get asked when being booked to play for a wedding.

The first thing to do is email me (my email address is angelinawarburton@gmail.com). I’m very friendly and would love to hear from you. We can chat about anything you like but it’s helpful if I have the following information:

1. The date and venue of your wedding

This is vital information to know from the start as I’ll be able to tell you immediately if I’m available. Knowing the venue from the start is great too as it means I can give you an accurate quote (see my page of standard fees). There may be a small extra charge if a change of venue is required (for example, if your ceremony is in a church but your reception is in a hotel).

2. Which part of the wedding would you like harp music for?

There’s lots of choice for you here. Most weddings have three main ingredients:

Ceremony
Drinks reception
Wedding breakfast

I am able to play for any combination of the above. When it comes to the ceremony, obviously the music is of utmost importance – let me know your choice of entrance and exit music as soon as you have decided, if you have a specific choice for the signing of the register, let me know that too and I’ll get practising!

p.s. ask me to email you my repertoire list too

Drinks reception and Wedding breakfast both simply require background music (up to two hours for drinks or three hours for breakfast).

3. Are there any special arrangements needed?

Aha… here’s the tricky bit.

A harp is worth anywhere between £16,000 right the way up to £50,000 and more, so we need to look after them very carefully.

Ideally, a venue will have the following:

A reserved car parking space near an accessible entrance – stairs are the enemy here. Think like a dalek. If there are a lot of stairs it’s not the end of the world, we may just need to make sure some staff are on hand to help me with any heavy lifting I may need to do. That’s what the best man is there for, right?
A place for the harp to be played that isn’t in anybody’s way but also isn’t too near a radiator/open fire

A little note about playing outside – it is possible, if the following are available:

Shelter from the sun/rain – lots of venues have parasols that can be put up – trees aren’t enough I’m afraid
Somewhere nearby to put covers and my trolley just in case the weather changes and I need to make a dash for it

Having said all this, if you have any questions, let me know and I’ll do my best to accommodate your wishes. I’m here to enhance your special day.

Ok, next. We’ve arranged the date, venue, any music requests and agreed on the fee, phew! Almost done, now we just need to make it official.

All harpists will have a different system here. But here’s mine:

I’ll email you a contract to confirm all the details of your wedding
A 50% deposit will be payable immediately
The remaining fee is due two weeks before the big day
The big day arrives, wonderful music happens, happiness ensues.

So there you have it! The ultimate guide to booking a harpist for your wedding. I really hope this helps, if you have any questions, just drop me an email – I’d love to talk through any queries you may have.

Career, Music

December 2014 catch-up…

21 January 2015 No Comments

This post is a continuation from last week’s post in which I raked over the glowing embers of November 2014, I originally wanted to put November and December into one huge post but alas, there was just too much to put in! So here’s a run-down of December 2014.

The first gig of the month was a solo recital! Yay! This is what it’s all about: performing lovely repertoire for a large, appreciative audience. Many thanks to Philip Scowcroft at Doncaster Museum and Art Gallery for inviting me back to perform – I always have a lovely time. Thanks also for inviting me and Marten to do a joint recital next year – time to find some harp and piano repertoire, suggestions in the comments please!!

On December 5th I had a background gig at Manchester Art Gallery. Those of you who know Manchester will be aware that there is very little parking around there. Pretty much none in fact. So I thought it would be a clever idea to get an estate car taxi to take me there – what could possibly go wrong?

I called the taxi company at least twice during the day to check the booking, 5pm estate car taxi to the city centre. Emphasis on the estate car part. Five o’clock rolls around, no taxi. At quarter past my phone rings to let me know the taxi’s outside, so I trundle out with the harp and all my bags.

It’s not an estate car.

Cue one diva-strop.

Car goes away, angry phone call to Radio Cars, an estate finally arrives. I’m now behind schedule. Trying to hold it together.

I arrange with the driver that he’ll come and pick me up after I’ve finished playing so I don’t have to go through that again. I’ve been asked to play downstairs in the foyer. But all that happens is people come in, hang up their coats, and head off upstairs to the party.

I’m providing music for the hanging up of coats. This has to be a new low.

Fast forward to the end of my set. No taxi.

Cue another massive diva-strop (I’m getting good at these) and phone call to Radio Cars “Yes, it’s the lady with the harp” to request an estate asap.

Taxi turns up, it’s not an estate.

By now I’m rather upset, I finished playing an hour ago and have gone nowhere. Another strop, another phone call and the driver who stood me up sheepishly apologises for not showing up when he said he would, and takes me home, where a party is currently underway, that I am hosting, that I am also very very late for.

Time to start drinking.

Luckily, by comparison the next few days went very smoothly. An hour of background music in Middlewich for a community Christmas buffet-type-thing (I had a lot of the cakes, they were excellent). Then on the Sunday I had the first Ceremony of Carols of the year down in Wilmslow – conducted by Lloyd Buck.

The Ceremony of Carols is a very special piece – written by Benjamin Britten. I’m sure it is special to many harpists, it’s just for treble voices and harp – although it has been arranged for a full choir.

The following weekend also had engagements on both days, so I decided to get my first ever spray tan in preparation (even my winter foundation for very pasty skin is now looking quite orange on me – I need some sun asap) I went for the lightest tan you can have (they call it ‘Glow’) and yea, it was fun for a few days, until it started coming off. In patches. Starting with my hands. Bad times.

Anyway…

On Saturday 13th December I was playing for a wedding banquet, in a marquee. A marquee in December? Sounds crazy but was in fact surprisingly cosy. Who knew?

The following day I headed over to attend York’s Annual Community Carol Concert. My dad has been conducting this event for decades. It usually attracts a crowd in the region of 1,500 and raises money for several good causes in and around York. They get a school band, a couple of school choirs, a church choir and a ‘novelty item’ (in 2013 it was my Harp Quartet CLOUDS) and we spend an afternoon together singing carols and being entertained by the wonderful Revd Andrew Foster. Father Christmas usually makes an appearance to hand out sweets. I honestly can’t say enough good things about this wonderful event. Long live YACCC!

We are now half-way through the month, almost there. Believe it or not December 2014 was comparatively quiet for me… I’ve had much busier Christmas seasons – I’ve also had quieter ones where I’ve had to live on frozen vegetables with rice due to lack of money. 2014 was a very happy medium, except for the fact that I’m pretty sure I had a chest infection (or just the worst cough of my life) and sounded like I was dying for the whole month.

On Friday 19th December it was time to head over to York again for the Masonic Carol Service that I always play for – this time I brought my own page-turner with me. Doesn’t he scrub up well?

This is another lovely event that takes place every year. We have a small service of lessons and carols, then claim a glass of sherry or three and head downstairs for a Christmas Dinner with all the trimmings. Just what we need. The evening then always finishes with my parents reading from Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. It’s predictable, it’s the same every year, but we love it and for me this evening is what starts Christmas off.

Saturday, 20th December was my final gig of 2014, and it was a Ceremony of Carols (what else?) in Rochdale.

I also contributed to this concert by playing a solo, Marcel Samuel Rousseau’s Variations Pastorales sur un vieux noel. One of my favourite solo pieces, but sadly it’s christmassy so I can’t really perform it any other time of year. It was so lovely to work with Michael Betteridge for this gig – his energy is fantastic – I do hope I can work with him again soon *hint hint*.

So there you have it. I didn’t mean for this post to turn into a 1000+ words epic but there you go. The rest of December was spent either with my parents in York, or with my sister down in the Midlands, lots of food was eaten, lots of wine was tasted. All in all a lovely Christmas, and for that I am very thankful.

I hope you all also had wonderful Christmasses and New Years. How are those resolutions going? Next week I’ll be gauging the success (or otherwise) of mine. Eeek.

Career, Music

November Catch Up…

15 January 2015 1 Comment

This blog has been quiet for a while so I thought this week’s post should address that and get you all up to date with the last few months of 2014 – my favourite time of the year for a number of reasons.

For the first gig of November I was playing for a Vintage Wedding Exhibition at the Bowden Rooms in Altrincham with the lovely flautist Anna Rosa Mari.

We definitely kept it professional (profesh??) at all times:

Next on the agenda was Bonfire Night – a rather weird claim to fame I can make is that I went to the same school as Guy Fawkes. I think everyone who went to St. Peter’s School in York has to mention this at some point during November 5th.

Now then, I am a tall girl, but in the huge crowd that gathered in Platt Fields Park in Manchester to watch the bonfire all I could really see was the fire, on the screens of the smartphones of the people around me. I don’t get why you would take a picture or a video of a big fire? Just enjoy it guys! Anyway, after the fireworks we rushed off for a Rusholme curry on the way home, the perfect way to warm up after standing outside for most of the evening. I think this needs to be our new Bonfire Night tradition.

The day after Bonfire Night is my Dad’s birthday so we decided to make the drive over to York to surprise him – these are appropriate for a man in his early eighties right??

The following weekend I had three gigs! Three gigs in two days! The first was a Fauré Requiem in Doncaster in honour of Remembrance Day:

Then on Sunday I was playing for a wedding in Bury:

This was then followed by another Fauré in St. Ann’s Church in Manchester.

I’m sure you’ll gather that this weekend was slightly crazy – it’s so good to be busy though.

On Tuesday 11th November it was my birthday so I decided to visit Dough in the Northern Quarter with a few friends, the food was amazing and we had a really lovely evening:

I also received this beautiful necklace from Marten, I don’t think I’ve taken it off since then! I love it:

The rest of the birthday week could have been a little more pleasant to be honest – it involved a dentist visit and spending a lot of money on my car to get it through its MOT. But enough of that! Let’s move swiftly on to the 22nd of November. I had a gig in Sheffield (my favourite) to play the Debussy Nocturnes and Holst’s The Planets. This gig was rather exciting as the other harpist was Calum Macleod and we could fit both harps in his van! So that meant no driving for me! I could definitely get used to that.

I’d never played the Nocturnes before, they are amazing – especially the third movement Sirènes, you can actually hear the mysterious song of the Sirens over the swirling sound of the sea and the waves – it’s breathtaking. The Planets will always be a favourite of mine too, the violence of Mars, the beauty of Venus, the mystery of Neptune, and Jupiter, the tune of which used to be a favourite hymn at school (who remembers the classic 295 ‘I Vow to Thee my Country’?)

Fast forward to the end of the month, the final gig of November was at Leeds Uni, playing Stravinsky’s Symphony in three movements. This piece is very cool and I suggest you have a listen if you’re unfamiliar. There’s lots of harp and the part is substantial so it’s a really good project to get stuck into.

This post was originally going to be November and December but it’s become so big I’m going to have to split it into two separate posts. Stay tuned for more craziness in December’s catch-up post.

Career, Music

Autumn Term

11 September 2014 1 Comment

The summer is drawing to a close and there’s a definite sense of ‘back to work’ here in Manchester.

It’s been a very chilled break for me, I spent some time in the Netherlands, where I had a few cycling lessons, learnt a bit of Dutch, ate a lot of food and drank lots of coffee. I also went on a few National Trust adventures and had many, many dinner parties with friends.

I had a few gigs here and there, mainly providing background music for weddings and other social occasions. It was enough to get me through August (just) but things feel like they’re stepping up a gear now.

It’s September, the start of a new term, I’ve joined a gym (and have been going three times a week) – already I feel like I have way more energy. Gigs are starting to come in thick and fast so I’m spending more time practising. The choir that I sing with has started up again after an August break, and with that the weekly trips to the pub also restart. The new term has also started at Chetham’s, where I work one day a week, how is it that some schoolkids now were born in 2006?!

So the upshot of all this is, all of a sudden I’m ridiculously busy! I’m seeing this as a very good thing as it means I may have money soon yay! I also need to start getting up early again (boo!) but for this I have freshly ground coffee that starts making itself at 7am – I don’t have the mental clarity to grind beans at that time.

I intend to be posting more or less weekly from now on. Just to keep checking in and keep this blog up to date. I hope all of your summers were lovely and that the start of term isn’t too traumatic!

Career, Music

Katherine Jenkins in Bridlington

3 June 2014 No Comments

Yay an outdoor concert!

Last Saturday was a rather exciting gig. I was playing with the National Symphony Orchestra in Burton Agnes (near Bridlington) as part of Katherine Jenkins’ summer tour.

I do love my Yorkshire gigs, it’s always lovely to be able to stay with my parents for a weekend, even though we mostly just eat, drink, and play Scrabble.

The programme proved very popular. With patriotic classics such as ‘We’ll Meet Again’, ‘Jerusalem’ and ‘A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square’ mixed in with songs from ‘Chess’ and ‘The Godfather’. Seeing two thousand people all standing to wave their Union Jacks and sing along to ‘Rule Britannia’ was actually quite emotional!

Katherine was also supported by the vocal group Celeste, and the biggest selling string quartet in history – Bond.

Playing for such a big crowd was brilliant, despite the fact that I hadn’t realised the gig was outside and had only brought a short-sleeved blouse… brrr!!

I had to move my car three times and another time someone else had to move it for me. That is simply not normal and highly irritating. The orchestra were all told to put our cars on the ‘land’ next to the hotel. What they didn’t realise was that it was private land (how did they not check this before?!) so to save us all getting towed away we had to find somewhere else to park – just before the gig – when 2000 other people had already filled up the car parks.

Anyway, a very nice man called Will kindly moved my car back down to the area near the stage, so I could load up and make a speedy exit – thanks Will!

Career

Balance

27 May 2014 No Comments

About seventeen years ago I had my first harp lesson (writing that made me feel insanely old).

The first thing you learn when playing the harp is to find the balance point. The harp is a heavy instrument, mine weighs in at around 36 kilos. However, they are designed so that, when tipped back into a playing position, they are almost weightless. All you need is to gently rest it on your knees and you don’t feel the weight at all. Once you find the balance point, everything becomes much easier.

I’ve been thinking recently about balance. This blog is about the experiences of a freelancer and a lot of that is about balance – balancing the different aspects of a career, or just a day, can be challenging.

In addition to this, I’ve started practicing yoga. The idea for this post came to me while I was in the tree. The tree pose, that is… I haven’t taken to climbing the trees of Central Manchester yet – although I’d hate to rule it out. Anyway, my fancy yoga ipad app told me that it helps your balance if you focus on an unmoving object. It’s certainly a helpful tip, but I wondered if it applies to more than yoga.

Maybe this rule could apply to our careers as well? If we have a specific focus in mind – a goal or a target – maybe we are more balanced in our approach? Conversely, what if we don’t really know where or what we are aiming for? Will we lose focus and fall out of balance?

What about balancing the different areas of our lives? Career, Family, a Relationship, Friends, Money, how do we know the best way to balance it all?

Something else I’ve learned from practising yoga is to not compare myself with others. Personally, I can’t touch my toes, yep, it’s embarrassing, but that’s what you get when you’re six foot tall and did all your growing in the space of about a year. It would take me weeks, possibly months of daily stretching to be able to touch my toes.

Some people don’t even think twice about it. But if I just gave up due to my blatant inadequacy, I wouldn’t get anywhere. I choose to practice and trust that I will improve gradually.

The same goes with music, by the way. I’m sure many of us are guilty of feeling like we’ll never be able to play like *insert amazing musician’s name here*, and feeling like there’s no point even trying. Maybe that person you aspire to emulate is thinking the exact same thing about someone else. Torturing yourself because you’re not there yet is counter-productive, you are on your own journey and need to stay focussed on your own targets, to stay balanced.

Lots of questions in this post I know – let’s call it thinking out loud. I need to figure out my own targets and focus on those, I need to find my own balance point.

Career, Music

What to expect when you leave music college.

12 April 2014 No Comments

It’s getting to that time of the academic year when music students are preparing for end of year recitals. For some of those students it will mean the end of formal education and the beginning of life in the big wide world.

During my last year at college I was mainly wondering how on earth I was going to make ends meet without my trusty student loan to get me through. Where was I going to find all this work I would need in order to pay the bills – council tax, what’s that??

I think it is natural to wonder what life will be like ‘on the outside’. With music, everyone’s experience will be different, I’m writing from the point of view of a harpist so my career will be different to other instrumentalists.

The first thing to expect when leaving music college is that there will be scary times. Times when money is way tighter than is comfortable, times when you look in the diary and realise there are no gigs three months from now. There are ways to overcome this fear: working hard and having faith. I’m not going to get all religious on you here, by faith I mean confidence in the fact that the work is out there somewhere – you just have to get out there and find it (that’s where the hard work comes in).

The second thing to expect after graduating – you will at some point be asked to play for free. This is a highly contentious issue and we all have to make the decision for ourselves. Personally, I don’t play for free for anyone except family. I don’t want people in the music world to know me as someone who will work for nothing. The most important reason I don’t play for free is: I can’t afford it.

Thirdly, you need to stay on top of emails/phone calls/voicemails.

The admin side is so important if you’re going to be successful as a freelancer. I’ve lost gigs because I forgot to answer a text or an email went into my junk mail instead of my inbox. Those are lost gigs. That is money down the drain. That is someone who won’t recommend you to their friends and who definitely won’t book you again. Make a ‘Needs Action’ folder for emails that need action and work your way through it meticulously.

Speaking of being meticulous – you need to watch your income and expenditure carefully.

Being a freelancer means you can earn vastly different amounts each month so it’s vital to know if you need to watch your spending during a rough patch. Try to squirrel away money when you can – for emergencies. A perk of keeping note of income and expenses is it takes no time at all to complete your tax return (go to an accountant) – I’ve already done mine for 13-14 and it took 15 minutes – Boom!

When I left college I found that I really missed my weekly lesson with my teacher.

I missed the little weekly targets and challenges. Once you graduate it’s easy to get into the rhythm of just practicing for the gigs you have coming up. One way to overcome this is to make sure you stay inspired – go to festivals, have lessons if you want to, go to lots of concerts, listen to solo repertoire and challenge yourself to keep adding to your own rep.

You may be about to leave formal education, but in those first few years out of college you will learn so much it’s unbelievable. I graduated three years ago and I still feel like I learn something new every day. I learn about what works and what doesn’t work in terms of organising myself and my working hours. I learn about how to work with different people and different personalities. I learn how to stand up for myself and say ‘no’ to gigs that don’t pay a reasonable fee, in good faith that I will find something better. My dad always says ‘you don’t learn to drive until after you’ve passed your test’. I think the same is true for freelancing. You have to make the jump and trust that you are capable of supporting yourself, you’ll learn the particulars along the way.

This way of life is so inspiring, you really are the master of your own destiny. Thing is, no one is going to gift-wrap a career and hand it to you on a plate, you have to get out there and find it for yourself. It’s daunting, but exciting.

A closing thought; remember that quote from American Beauty?

In order to be successful, one must project an image of success.

When it comes to social media, it’s all about projecting the image you want people to see. I’m talking about band/musician pages here – not our personal pages. Make your twitter page interesting, talk to people, build relationships with others in the same boat as you. Get really good photos taken and use them.

I’m not just talking about our online presence though. I mean in real life too. Do you show up to rehearsals late/scruffily turned out/hungover? Is that making the best impression? It sounds awful but sometimes it’s not just about the music. If you are rude to a fixer or you don’t get back to them, they won’t call you again and you’ll be off the list. If you get back to them promptly and are friendly and helpful on the phone – even if you are unable to do the gig they will probably call again. You need to be showing the best of yourself as much as you humanly can. Look your best, stay healthy, be friendly and polite and doors will open for you.

So there you have it, thoughts on leaving music college. Music graduates – do you have anything to add? Leave a comment below.

Finally I want to wish all the RNCM Harpists the best of luck with your upcoming recitals! I can’t wait to come and hear you (and celebrate with you afterwards).

Career

How to make your grass greener.

6 February 2014 3 Comments

Ok, this isn’t a post about gardening, sorry to anyone who stumbles across this post looking for lawn maintenance tips.

Having worked in retail, and in various roles as a musician, the phrase the grass is always greener on the other side comes to mind from time to time.

When you’re a freelancer, it’s so easy (pretty much unavoidable) to dream of the pension plans, stable income, job benefits, and general security that come with a full-time job. I’ve been there, I went and got the job. But when you’re on the other side of the fence expecting the wonderful life of having a payday each month, suddenly you begin to dream of the freedom to follow your passion, to travel, to be creative everyday, to not have a boss to contend with (my boss was lovely by the way!)

Basically, whatever you do, there’s always going to be a tempting alternative. So I think, instead of always looking around the next corner to see if something better is on the horizon, why don’t we look around us now and think ‘ok, how can I make my current situation better for myself?’ That way we won’t end up running so far from one extreme that we tumble off the other.

Do you remember that film called ‘The Secret’? A lot of people dismiss it as nonsense but in my opinion a lot can be learned from its principles. We have to be grateful for all the good things in our lives in order for us to have more to be grateful for. We need to do more of what we love and move in that direction. So for me, I love orchestral playing, I also want to travel. I love writing my blog and may someday investigate doing some sort of freelance writing. I love the freedom of setting my own schedule, fixing my own diary and taking responsibility for myself. I need to focus on these things that I love and do as much of them as I possibly can.

Things I’m not so keen on – feeling skint all the time. Well… I was still skint when I had my retail job. Also, you don’t need money to be happy – it helps – but I believe you can be happy when you’re low on funds. The skint-ness can be fixed by careful spending (check) and working harder (an ongoing process). As I’ve mentioned before, I have a wonderful app on my iPhone called Budget – Back in Black. So as long as I keep a record of income and outgoings, and stick to my savings goals, I can sort of trust that the money will come if I keep focussing on doing what I love. To a certain extent I can stop worrying about the money side of things. Worry is such a useless emotion.

Anyhoo…

I guess a good goal would be to stop wishing to be on the other side of the fence, and instead for each of us to cultivate our own side to the extent that we wouldn’t wish to be anywhere else.

Lifestyle, Music

Running vs Practice

20 January 2014 2 Comments

Last November I turned 25. As a result, I decided it was time to look after myself, and my health. So on December 1st 2013 I restarted my running. I ran over 40km that month and am on course to beat that in January. I’m working my way through a Couch-10K app for anyone who is interested.

The regular practice of running has led me to ponder the similarities between running and music.

Firstly, I am not a gifted runner. Anyone who went to school with me can testify to that. BUT, having been working at it for a number of weeks I’m a lot fitter than I used to be. So if someone who is naturally gifted at running never trains, could they still beat the less talented but conscientious trainer? I’m not so sure.

You can apply this analogy to music. I admit that from an early age, teachers seemed to think I had an aptitude for the harp, and this, coupled with years of practice has allowed me to get to where I am now. But, had I not practiced and just trusted my ‘gift’, I wouldn’t have got anywhere.

This comes back to the whole nature/nurture debate. When people tell me how lucky I am to have such a talent (implying that I was somehow born being able to put on a full evening recital), I want to tell them actually no it’s not luck – I worked damn hard to be able to do this (I don’t actually say that, it comes across as rude for some reason). I feel that putting achievements down to talent alone is inaccurate and insulting to those who work hard every day to be able to do what they do.

The same with running, right now there is no way I could run a marathon (or even a half), but with training and regular practice, who knows how far I could go (pun intended). Maybe what we are born with is the potential, what we do with it is up to us.

Another similarity between the two disciplines. You can practice for years and it never feels any easier. What was hard for me in the first week of December I now do regularly, but now I am working on more challenging things. When practising, you are always pushing yourself to be better, to achieve more, to go faster, to improve technique. As a result, practising will always feel hard. It is about finding your own weak spots and putting them under a microscope. It’s a search and destroy mission to remove weaknesses in performance. It is mentally and physically draining, and if you aren’t passionately committed to it, it will be very unpleasant.

Still, it’s a voyage of discovery. It’s satisfying to be able to do things you were previously unable to do. A future post will be talking about how to practice effectively (musically speaking). Proficiency in any discipline is very satisfying, not to mention absolutely vital if you are attempting to make a career of it.

Career

Erm, where’s my time off?

10 January 2014 2 Comments

I hope everyone is settling in to the New Year nicely, who is keeping their resolutions?

So I just looked back to my ‘Week 2’ post of last year. It makes rather depressing reading. I was struggling financially and needed a part time job to tide me over. I felt out of control regarding my earnings and hated living month to month, not knowing if I’d be able to pay rent next month.

Well, a lot can change in a year.

I had so much work in November and December of 2013 it was absolutely fantastic, as well as a bit frantic. I admit I was looking forward to the quiet of January. I knew I’d made enough money to feed myself even if I got no work this month – which happily isn’t the case. I also feel a lot more in control of my finances since using the iPhone app ‘Back in Black’, which I talk about in the post Will We Always Feel Skint?

So rather than wallowing in the lack of work and freaking out about the future, I’m taking a different approach this year. I’m being generally a bit more on it, getting stuff done regarding admin, practice and other life-stuff that needs doing. I’m also using this time to take stock, to think about possible projects for the upcoming year and setting myself some targets. More info coming on those projects as and when… but I’m pretty excited already! So basically, when I thought January would be something of a holiday, I was wrong, it’s a holiday from three gigs a week but there’s still so much to do!

This last week I’ve been playing down in London, but annoyingly I’m not allowed to say what I was doing! This will definitely be the subject of a post around April time so keep your eyes peeled. This photo was shared on Facebook so I guess I’m allowed to share it here, check out the beautiful paper birds:

But that’s literally all I can say at this point, so watch this space!

In other news, my harp quartet have been brainstorming ideas for this year too. 2014 is going to be an exciting year. If you haven’t seen our website yet you can visit it here.

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