Meet Me In Winter » katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org make music make a difference Tue, 13 Nov 2012 11:34:41 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.3 It began with a tune… http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/it-began-with-a-tune/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/it-began-with-a-tune/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 15:31:45 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1662 When composer and pianist Katie Elliott sent a tune across the Channel to lyricist Anthony Marks, she wanted to create a song to celebrate friendship and people’s power to change things. She recognised that the love and support of her community had made all the difference to her when she needed it and she wanted to give something back.
 
If you’d like to know more about Katie’s story, you can watch it here.

 

 

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/it-began-with-a-tune/feed/ 0 An extraordinary community http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/the-project-grows/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/the-project-grows/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 15:29:47 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1665 Gathering round her a large team of local people in her home-town of Wotton under Edge, Gloucestershire, Katie masterminded a huge project to create a charity single and music video performed by members of the community. Singers of all ages rehearsed long hours, making new friends along the way. Dancers, skateboarders, shop owners, scouts – all volunteeered to become involved in the music video. Community photo shoots took place with whole families, football teams, book groups, members of local churches, painters, business people coming to take part.

 

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/the-project-grows/feed/ 0 A prestigious team http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/a-prestigious-team/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/a-prestigious-team/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 15:27:24 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1668 A team of top professionals soon volunteered to become involved. The song was produced and arranged by Ian Dean, a London producer who had collaborated with some of the best pop, jazz and classical musicians in the world. Musicians Jim Barr, Andrew Tween, Fiona Barrow and Andy Christie had toured and recorded with numerous major artists between them, including Portishead, Seth Lakeman and Curved Air. Former-BBC recording engineer Jonathan Lane made sure of an impeccable recording, from which Nigel Heath (who had recently won a BAFTA for his work on Downton Abbey) was able to create a stunning Dolby Surround sound mix for the video, directed by Italian film-maker Alberto Bona. Official photographer Barry Batchelor had just retired after 30 years working for the Press Association, travelling all over the world and supplying all the major newspapers with photographs. Last but not least, the project logo was designed by legendary graphic designer David Hillman, best known for rebranding The Guardian newspaper.

 

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/a-prestigious-team/feed/ 0 Media interest http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/media-interest/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/media-interest/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 15:25:43 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1671 The local and national media became involved. There were numerous radio interviews and pieces in the national press, such as this one from the Daily Mail and this one seen by 3 million Metro readers after the music video was premiered at Wotton Electric Picture House. Soon people were getting in touch from all over the world, including the team at Our World Today in Australia.
 
Other choirs and singing organisations started to become involved: the Supertroupers Age UK choir based in Stroud, several workplace choirs run by Singing Works in central London, and the Singing it Back community choirs from Kingston-upon-Thames.

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/media-interest/feed/ 0 Flashmobs http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/flashmobs/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/flashmobs/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 15:19:07 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1681 The soloists and choir travelled to London to perform as a flashmob. They sang for thousands all around the capital, including as many major landmarks as they could manage. The next day, their story appeared in over 150 newspapers. There was talk of a surprise chart hit…

In the end, it was the Military Wives who provided the year’s heartwarming charity number 1, but the people of Wotton-under-Edge had, in their own quiet way, made a significant difference all over the world.
Through their determination to campaign to improve the lives of others and their extraordinary celebration of community, they created resources, goodwill and friendships which hadn’t existed before. They demonstrated that together we can do extraordinary things.

So….what extraordinary thing shall we do next?

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/flashmobs/feed/ 0 A small community making a big difference… http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/a-small-community-making-a-big-difference/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/a-small-community-making-a-big-difference/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 14:31:36 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1654 Last year hundreds of people from a small, rural community in the UK joined forces to do something extraordinary. They wanted to make a positive difference in the world – to raise awareness of the value of community, to raise money for charity and to get people talking about issues such as mental health and homelessness.

This site tells the story of what happened…

 

 

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/10/a-small-community-making-a-big-difference/feed/ 0 New video http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/03/new-video/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/03/new-video/#comments Thu, 08 Mar 2012 16:36:37 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1426 On the 20th December 2011 I was invited to go and take part in the Singing Works carol concert at St Margaret Patten church in the City of London.

It was a wonderful occasion, with beautiful singing from the works choirs of the Royal Mail, Nomura and SJ Berwin as well as Singing Works patron, Simon O’Neill. It was also a welcome opportunity to spread the word about MMiW as well as teach the song to lots more people.

Thanks to all at Singing Works and the film-making skill of our dear friend Alberto Bona you can see a little taster of what happened here

 

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/03/new-video/feed/ 0 Thanks to KLB school http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/02/thanks-to-klb-school/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/02/thanks-to-klb-school/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:56:00 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1421 A great big thank you to everyone at Katherine Lady Berkeley School, Wotton-under-Edge, who helped to raise a fantastic £285 towards our three charities – £100 each to Shelter and Mind and £85 to Wotton Youth. The support of our local community and particularly the schools has been absolutely invaluable to the project and everyone at MMiW is very grateful. Thank you!!

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2012/02/thanks-to-klb-school/feed/ 0 From the other side of the world! http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2011/12/from-the-other-side-of-the-world/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2011/12/from-the-other-side-of-the-world/#comments Tue, 13 Dec 2011 08:39:21 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1415 When I said that through this project we were making new friends all over the world, I wasn’t kidding. This morning I opened my inbox to find messages from journalist Suzanne Devonshire and director and editor Mike Worsman at Our World Today, a news website based in Adelaide. They had heard about our story from our friends at Action for Happiness and wanted to write about us. Here’s the article.

We hope to link up with them more in the future, but in the meantime, I’m sending a big cheery wave and many thanks on behalf of everyone at Meet Me in Winter. We may not share the same winter, but it seems we have lots of other things in common!

 

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]]> http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2011/12/from-the-other-side-of-the-world/feed/ 0 BBC Radio Bristol with John Darvall http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2011/12/bbc-radio-bristol-with-john-darvall/ http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/2011/12/bbc-radio-bristol-with-john-darvall/#comments Mon, 12 Dec 2011 15:41:37 +0000 katie http://www.meetmeinwinter.org/?p=1411 Another radio interview this morning, and this time a particularly in-depth and candid one – around 20 minutes long in fact! It was great talking with John Darvall at BBC Radio Bristol, who asked a lot of questions about the inspiration behind the project and why it is so important to me to try and give something back. The only down side was that they couldn’t find their copy of our song, so weren’t able to play it :(

Never mind – we’ll ask them very nicely to play it for us another day soon! To listen, click here and scroll through to 2:08:30.

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