During the Covid-19 crisis, it was the well-being of others that concerned us especially some of us receiving difficult news and losing loved ones all around us. Su even had to deal with an immediate family member in intensive care for a few weeks. Music and creativity is a saviour at times like these so we decided to help others keep music going, but virtually. When lockdown was in the horizon, Su prepared quite early to deal with it; so much so that the first online session was ready to roll on the second day of our first lockdown in the UK. Su teaches music lessons online so she already had a system in place for dealing with the latency delay issues and focusing the music and sound for the listener.
For this session, we originally started with just the Facebook live stream video which was quite successful with the chat for interaction. Then after running several sessions, we made more improvements based on community feedback and also upped the tech and gear. Jules on guitar has a lot of great audio gear so we used his studio for some time until Su moved back home(ish). Jules is also a bit of a social character(!) and suggested using Zoom for more interactivity. Su quite likes hiding so she wasn’t too enthused about it and it would mean more stuff to organise in Su’s control freakish way; but we did it without strangling each other too much and the improvements became a huge success!
Inviting people to attend a virtual session was one of the biggest challenges. Su and Jules originally started by running Zoom tutorials to help people get set up and stay connected. Su also worked on how to change our human behaviour with becoming used to online video communication.. Many people found it difficult and uncomfortable to get used to at first which was very normal, but once they got the hang of it using very simple gestures, it works! We have a strong group of 20+ on Tuesday and Sunday Slow jams. The session is also viewable on YouTube to keep things easy to access.
Who is Su & Jules though?
Su is a long time addict of Old Time music and banjo playing! She has regularly helped lead sessions in Somerset, Devon and now online during Covid times. She also teaches a range of instruments having started learning guitar and then dabbling on everything else!
Jules is an even longer time addict of music and normally a bass player, but also plays a range of noisy things including the theremin and saw! He has been known as a member of The Thunderbridge Bluegrass Boys, but is also part of many other musical projects. He works extensively in theatre where he composes and plays and tours regularly, recently touring Platform 4’s “Day of the Triffids” and Walk ThE Plank’s “Green Space Dark Skies”.