THE CONDUIT COMPOSER

Saturday 17 October 2015

A taster of The Tethered Fairy Ring LIVE in France


So excited to share with you this little fairy taster of  my composition 'The Tethered Fairy Ring: A Symphonic Poem for Ukulele' being performed here by myself and Susan Berry in a beautiful old church in the centre of
 St. Quentin les Chardonnets
Lower Normandy, France.

An authentic unedited film of the full 20 minute performance is now available:

Kindly email me at: cherylbeermusic@gmail.com
for details of cost & postage.

Many thanks  and much love to you in advance
for supporting our work.

Thursday 15 October 2015

Living Total Truth





I find myself at a point of great transition, with many important things hanging in the air; Where to live, how to immerse myself full time as an 'artist' in my own right, the financial concerns, physical exhaustion, broken heart ... I expect you know some, if not all and more of this list too, yes?

Rather than worry about these things in the way I would usually, rather than make endless lists of how to solve all my problems simply by ticking off the things on the list, I have been allowing my thoughts to float past me on a flowing river of life. A bit like a really important game of pooh sticks! Watching ideas float alongside each other as they bob and jostle, travelling light beneath the bridge.



And I stand on that bridge, calmly focussed on my breathing. I have let go of the constant stress of finding potential solutions. 

I have done this by imagining they are autumn leaves of all different sizes, textures and colours. I have looked at them and wondered at the beauty of each one without lingering and then let them go back to the flow of the river, waiting to see the other leaves that come. 

This evening, a new leaf came. one that has never come before; one that is making my heart skip a beat. A thrilling, challenging, exciting, immersion into how I want my life to 'be'. A chance at total truth; a beautiful, blissful risk. 


The river has stood still, this autumn leaf does not want to leave and the river does not want to take it. I will sleep with it under my pillow ... 





Thursday 8 October 2015

Most Ancient Tree




Aren't trees awesome! 
I mean, ALL trees ...

...  but in actual fact, it transpires that some trees 
are even MORE awesome than you first guessed!




This is me (left) and April Song. 
You may recognise my dear friend 
and soul sista from earlier blogs.

Today, after a wonderful catch up in Greenspace Gallery, Carmarthen, we didn't feel we wanted to go home, so we went to the woods at 
Carmarthen Museum in Abergwili. 


I have been coming to this woods for many years. It's usually full of dog walkers when I come at tea time, but this afternoon, it was pretty much us, apart from the odd person or dog.



And we happened upon this exquisite tree


With cascading flutters of butterfly leaves



April knows a good deal about trees. 
Their names, their healing qualities, 
which ones make good buttons ...

But she did not know this one




So, I took photo's and then when I got home I sent one to my friend Rob. This is Rob (below) at The Men's Shed Project. I'll let you work out which one looks clever enough to  know everything there is to know about ... well ... just about everything it seems, though he doesn't shout about it. On the contrary, he's most unassuming about his wisdom and wizardry.



And it tuns out that our tree is really a rather ancient and rare species called

Ginkgo biloba





Now then, there is a male tree and a female tree and they pollinate each other, one having cones and the other having cone shape reciprocals. 

This has worked for them since dinosaurs ate their fluttering leaves. However, this particular tree is the last breed of the ancient species.

Here's a wiki link incase you're as fascinated as I am in this beautiful find:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginkgo_biloba


Poetry to change lives: National Poetry Day




It gives me great pleasure on National Poetry Day to tell you about a very meaningful piece of poetry that I was involved with this week.

On Tuesday, I was invited to take part in Reconstructing Ourselves. 

Here is a quote from their website to explain the project:-


'Recontrsucting Ourselves is an Arts Council Wales funded project exploring the stories, lives and experiences of breast reconstruction patients and staff at Morriston Hospital, Swansea.

As part of this new Artist in Residence scheme for ABMU healthboard (running from Apr 2014-Sep 2015) Prue Thimbleby (www.prue.thimbleby.net), Sarah Wright and Rhian Solomon (www.rhiansolomon.co.uk) – a duo of Artists and a clinical Anthropologist - will be working alongside clinicians and patients from Morriston hospital – listening, talking, interpreting and recreating the detailed dialogues and narratives of the people that they meet.

Sarah Wright will be leading a research strand to the project - asking the question; 'Does giving patients the chance to record what they want to say to the consultant and playing this at the start of the consultation improve the outcome?'

Rhian Solomon will be leading art workshops with the patients, facilitating creative works in response to their experiences. 

The project will culminate in a symposium and exhibition which will show the results of the research, a new collection of work by Rhian Solomon which wil be informed by art workshops with patients and staff and a series of digital stories(www.swanseastorytelling.com) told by participants involved in the project. The stories will be facilitated by Prue Thimbleby and will involve photography students from The University of Wales, Trinty St David. The university will also be supporting Rhian Solomon through access to their specialist workshops and studios.' 



I was contracted to do 2 things at the Symposium: to perform my daily practice of music & mantra in showing how I have applied the arts in reconstructing myself and to spend the day at the event as an Ethnographic Poet.

Here is the first page of my report from my work as an ethnographic poet on the day to explain my role more clearly:_


 Reconstructing Ourselves

Creating an Evaluative Dialogue with Ethnographic Poetics

Ethnographic Poet
Cheryl Beer


Ethnographic Poet, Cheryl Beer, combines the skills of a participant observer and poet to collate dialogue that represents the thoughts and feelings fed back by event attendees, project participants and speakers at the Reconstructing Ourselves Symposium.

In creating a dialogue through immediate response poetics, we are enabled to integrally apply the arts in measuring itself.

Although the influence of the ethnographic poet cannot be divorced from the dialogue content chosen for the poetic structure, the poems created reflect the tone and emotion, sentiment and political view  from recipients, rather than that of the poet. The ethnographic poet is a conduit.

The skill of the ethnographic poet is to hold the poetic framework as objectively as is possible within qualitative research, whilst acknowledging the presence of self, so as to capture the essence of the symposium dialogue.

Cheryl Beer has 35 years of experience within ethnographic poetics, applying this honed skill in many arts settings. For instance, she collated ethnographic poetics from 270 members of the public from across 7 counties, to write a collection of 30 songs for part of the research regarding the '21 Year Vision of the Arts' kindly funded by The Arts Council of Wales, Arts Connect and The Welsh Government.

More recently Cheryl's work has been part of an academic journey during her MA Drama,  influenced by the research of Frances Rapport (2013) embedding ethnographic poetics firmly within the debate regarding the validity of such research as qualitative analysis.

At the Reconstructing Ourselves Symposium, Cheryl performed some of the dialogue as a spoken word poem in the morning and she engaged 7 attendees of the symposium to participate in a final sharing of music and ethnographic poetics in closing of the event.


Reference: Rapport. F. (2013) Fragments: Transcribing the Holocaust. Hafan Books. Swansea



So, as you can see, the application of ethnographic poetics in this context quite literally is part of an Arts & Science Movement that is changing the lives of women who have undergone or are undergoing breast reconstruction.

The very exciting news & so apt for  National Poetry Day, is that the poems are now going to be made into one of the books within the exhibition  showing at Morriston Hospital and you can arrange to go and visit and read them alongside all of the amazing life changing work.

If you would like to go to the exhibition, here's the link to the contact page of the website where you can get hold of Prue Thimbleby, the Arts in Health Co-ordinator: 

 http://www.reconstructingourselves.com/#!contact/c16fm



Monday 5 October 2015

Reconstructing Ourselves


Thank you so much to Prue Thimbleby for inviting me to Reconstructing Oursleves where I join a brilliant programme of performers and speakers tomorrow. 


I will be sharing my own healing practice through music and mantra as well as making an ethnographic poem with the delegates about their own experiences and performing this at the close of the event.

This is the link to book your free tickets to the event. There are still a few spaces left: 




Listening to the Universe




 My dear friends

While in France chanting mantra in an orchard for the month of September, I struggled to blog for a number of reasons. First, the blooming internet coverage was a tad patchy but even when I could get on line, I could not get blogger to upload. 

I carried on writing but went completely old school. Yes, a pen and paper! And do you know what, it felt wonderful.



Also while I was there, I started making concertina books. 


Alison Smith who owns the gites is an Artist and she showed me how to make some lovely books and taking her lead I got myself well and truly book - hooked. 



So, this is what I think is going to happen now, although I am leaving space for the idea to grow. I am going to write a book about my time in France, sat under the apple tree in the orchard. You know, a strange thing happens when you spend this amount of time with a tree. I really did fall in love! 


I didn't think it was possible to fall in love with a tree, but it is and if you listen very carefully, she has so many lessons to teach. And this will be the central focus of my new book.


I'm not sure how many books, or if I will hand make them, or how it will work but for now all I know is that I am writing a book about my relationship with a tree in France 
and that I like making books.

 

I think these 2 things fit together well.



Off course, through Parlor Press, my community publishing company, I have made it possible for literally 1000's of people to be published over the last 15 years but this time, it is me that I am empowering to live the dream. 


And what is great is that it doesn't feel selfish, or self absorbed, it feels right and kind and loving and self caring.