If I were to have a conversation with my fifteen year old self.

"I listen to anything apart from Opera and Country."

"Listen to country music! Who am I?  My gran?"

"Its soooo over dramatic and boring."

"All their songs are whiny and about God or heartbreak."

I said lines similar to this when i was around 15 years of age. Lets face if we all had a time machine I am certain there are many conversations we would have with our younger selves. As a teenager music is a sense of self and independence. I still liked some pop music but was leaving behind the plastering my walls with boy bands. Listening to more Indie and punk bands like Greenday, Foo Fighters and Stereophonics. Along with a growing interest in movie soundtracks and hip pop. However I would have melted with embarrassment and rolled over in my skinny coloured jeans and Benetton jumpers and laughed if you had told me : When your 30 you are going to find a taste for country music. Nope. No way. Not in a month of Sundays would I have taken you seriously.

But here I sit listening to a play list filled with country tracks that even Dolly Parton would be proud of. Opera I now enjoy having been taught to sing "lascia ch'io pianga" by a singing tutor. Yes in Italian and all. It is a very complex and beautiful song. As Opera is all about story songs I wish I had not been as naive as a teenager and listened to it more.

So as tastes change I wonder if in another 15 years time I might be listening to another whole different genre of music. Raving it up to heavy techno music at the age of 45. Who knows what the future holds? But for now I shall remain the girl who is a a little bit country but a whole lot of rock and roll.

Track of this Blog: Stars Tonight by Lady Antebellum


Interesting Read: University of Cambridge research link.

This is the New Year.

I have written before about the power I feel that a good soundtrack on a show can have. These days I find myself using the shazam app in order to find out tracks playing in a recent episode. At times even watching a scene over just to hear the track again. I am not going to deny I do watch a lot of TV shows. With my husband however (saying that will never get old) It is a thing we do together. Catching up on the weekly goings on of "Sons of Anarchy" and "NCIS". I often wonder who chooses the tunes?

I find that when creating work with children that I have to be careful which music is used for their scenes. Point A is that it has to be child friendly and B It has to suit the scene. I have been caught out and had to use some of my own musical tastes, which the 9- 12 year old group can screw their noses up at and the 6- 8 year old kids have no idea that a song was possibly released prior to their birth everything post the recent top 40 to them is old. The thing is I don't want to feel as if  music is pushed on people. At times hobbies and passions can be. Saying to me "Oh i don't really like music" is like saying you don't really like to breathe. A bit harsh and over dramatic but never the less true. I adore it.  To someone else it could be "I  don't really like football", "I don't really like dancing". We all have different things that drive us and we are all different people.

 As the new term of classes I assist are about to commence I have found myself at my computer with my old ipod and this term I shall not be caught out.Yes this does mean that the latest version of the Now pop album will be downloaded but at least I should have something for everybody. I just wonder if the big producers on TV shows do similar things. I feel elated if a kid ask me who a song is by because they like it. I feel I have passed on something they may look into. If an artist I adore receives a you tube hit from a kid hearing a track I have played. I can only be doing something right.

 So as I shazam this weeks track from an episode of "Person of Interest" Big TV Exec show music director person. Please know that you are doing some great work. Maybe I will use your chosen track in my own work as this weeks warm up.  Teaching kids drama is one of the most rewarding jobs. It is fun, it is exciting. it is tiring and at times can try your patience. But I would not swap working in theatre for anything. Even to pick the tracks on a TV show.



P.S The track from Person of Interest was Building Steam with a grain of salt. By DJ Shadow
Check it out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcxsheROd3E