Ten years spent setting young musicians free

Published on Friday 13 June 2008 08:54

SINCE 1997, Drake Music Scotland has created opportunities for people with disabilities to make music using sophisticated new technologies that allow people with limited movement to play.

To celebrate the charity's 10th Anniversary the Queen's Hall will host Now We Are 10, a special concert tonight featuring performances by Rhona Smith and Patrick Wilson, two highly talented young musicians with disabilities.

Smith, who has cerebral palsy and uses E-Scape, a computer programme that allows her to press a switch to play each bar of music, and operate another switch giving her the power to be more expressive, will perform Spiegel im Spiegel for violin, by modern composer Arvo Part.

Wilson, who also has cerebral palsy and has used various technologies to enable him to play, including the cutting-edge Brainfingers system, which he controls with his facial muscles and alpha and beta brainwaves.

"I can play music with my teeth," he says proudly, adding that this evening he will play the Soundbeam in a special improvisation called Nightfall.

Smith's mother, Vicky, adds, "I know from personal experience the joy it brings to somebody unable to play an instrument to be able to say, "I played the harp today' and to be on an equal par with their peers and fulfil a dream that they and we as parents never thought possible."

The Drake Music Project was founded in England in 1988 by Adle Drake as a research project into the use of computers to make music accessible for people with disabilities and over the last ten years has brought the enjoyment of music making to more than 4000 children and adults north of the border.

Thursa Sanderson, director of Drake Music Scotland, says, "We have focused our efforts on providing the greatest degree of independence for all our participants, by using a range of different music technologies so they can be actively involved in playing and performing."

Compred by Gerry Mulgrew of Communicado Theatre Company, other musicians performing at the Queen's Hall include pupils from Edinburgh's Braidburn and Prospect Bank Schools, the Antonine Players from Drumchapel, Glasgow together with members of the RSNO Big Band and Drake Music Scotland's in-house band, Audability.

&#149 Now We Are Ten!, Queen's Hall, Clerk Street, tonight, 7.30pm, 10, 0131-668 2019