TINDERBOX ORCHESTRA
Tinderbox is a collective of young people, musicians, artists and youth workers in Scotland. I have been involved since its formation in 2011 and seen countless young people become musicians and flourish into professional players, therapists and leaders. What began as a ragtag bunch of misfits, sharing skills and swapping stories, is fast becoming Scotland's answer to alternate music education.
From grass-roots youth work to award-winning arts and music productions, Tinderbox is now a creative community aiming to ignite a spark in people – one which fills them with imagination and sense of possibility. Their work uses music and the arts to bring people together and strengthen communities, providing exciting opportunities that support young people to build their confidence, skills, self-esteem, and professional experience.
From 'Journey of a Thousand Wings,'(above), to their 5-year Annivesary Concert(below) to numerous Hidden Door Festival appearances(below) and right through their debut album recording, release and beyond, Tinderbox has allowed me to grow as a professional composer, conductor, producer, session leader, orchestrator, administrator and as a musician.
SUGGESTURE
SUGGESTURE is a constantly evolving system of gestures used to focus the live improvisation of musicians and allow an element of instant composition by the 'Suggestor', who ‘free conducts’ the band using this vocabulary of hand and body signals. I developed this system over a number of years with The Katet during our late night weekly residency at Edinburgh’s Jazz Bar before bringing it to the Tinderbox Orchestra where it took on a whole new, orchestral form.
THE STORY
The origins of Suggesture are simple; a few note names, a signal for a full band hit etc. inspred by Wing Chun Kung Fu techniques. Through a period of natural selection, the signals, concepts and ideas changed, were broken down, and were replaced by better ones.
As the rapport within the band developed, so did our scope for improvisation and instant composition leading to the generation of 40-minute improvised jams complete with head sections, choruses, transitions, development, solo sections and recapitulations - all off the cuff.
To put it simply, we were playing brand new and engaging music from start to finish. Anytime it started to get boring we could change it up to a new and fully formed musical idea, almost immediately. And all the while, the audience could watch the whole process happen in real-time.
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Over the years, the system was adopted by Tinderbox to use in school and community music workshops as well as in their advanced orchestra. Gestures still get added and adapted, some get dropped, some take on new meaning. The system is alive in this way, and continues to grow on its own now.
Suggesture improvisation at Edinburgh International Film Festival, 2018
Suggesture workshop with
The Nevis Ensemble, 2018
Suggesture workshop with Tinderbox Intermediate Orchestra(Sparks), 2018