Transforming Communities

Musical Mondays Manchester

Join Live Music Now and Manchester’s My Hub and One Education Music Service for Musical Mondays, a monthly series of live online concerts streamed directly into the comfort of your school hall or classroom.

Musical Monday concerts are engaging, lively and educational,  featuring a variety of world-class professional musicians from all backgrounds and genres.

  • Concerts are held as Zoom Webinars*, a very safe way of holding an event online.
  • Only the musicians & Live Music Now host are visible on screen.
  • Say hello and engage with the musicians using the chat function, and ask them questions during the Q&A.
  • To get the most out of the experience, we recommend children at home watch the concert with a parent or carer if possible.

Sign up

To sign up to the series and receive a Zoom link for concerts, please contact:
[email protected] / 0161 276 0104

If you have any questions or trouble logging on to view a concert, please contact:
[email protected]

“The musician was excellent at explaining clearly, and honestly, his thoughts and feelings on music and how it has helped him. He also shared excellent lessons for the children in how to do what he does. He spaced the session out with a mix of conversation/questions, performance and instructional sections really nicely to keep the children engaged.”

Autumn Term 2023

2 October 2022
1.30pm – 2.15pm
Dean Yhnell (Beatboxer)

Dean breaks down the processes involved and will show you that anyone can be a beatboxer as well as discussing his route into Beatboxing and how it has helped him manage Tourettes Syndrome. Dean Yhnell a.k.a. Beat Technique After making the leap into professional beatboxing in 2010 Dean’s career and repertoire have blossomed. He has forged a unique performance style and stage presence, which were built on the stages and events of Glastonbury, the O2, Royal Ascot and Silverstone to name a few. 

Dean has become heavily involved in the beatbox battle scene, competing in the UK championships in 2014 before participating in the first ever Welsh Beatbox Championships in 2015 where he lost narrowly to the eventual winner in the semi-final stages. Dean now spends the majority of his time teaching young people in schools and youth organisations the art of beatbox, rap, dj-ing and music production, improving their communication, literacy and confidence levels through his teaching style. He has achieved much success with disaffected young people who find school a challenge, enabling them to improve attendance, behaviour and motivation in all areas of the curriculum.

 

Spring Term 2024

5 February 2024
1:30pm – 2:15pm
Filkin’s Duo:
Chris Roberts (Guitar) & Seth Bye (Fiddle & Accordion)

Join the Filkin’s Duo on a pirate adventure across the seven seas! Come dressed-up ready for some foot-stomping tunes, lively sea shanties, and bad jokes. Meeting in the multicultural city of Birmingham, Filkin’s Duo weave together intricate melodies from the folklore of their homes, Wales and Gloucestershire. Their music combines the traditional and the contemporary, blending fiddle, guitar, harmonium and mandolin with their close vocal harmonies.

Chris Roberts’ training in classical guitar means he soars effortlessly through jigs and reels with an unrivalled purity in his steel string playing. Seth Bye has been long established on the folk scene, performing with The Destroyers, Joe Broughton’s Conservatoire Folk Ensemble and Gathering Tides. His “fantastic fiddle-driven energy” (BBC Radio Glos) and multi-instrumental abilities combine with a showmanship that could only be gained from touring with Giffords Circus.

 

Summer Term 2024

1st July 2024
1.30pm – 2.15pm
Chroma Harp

Award winning contemporary UK duo, breaking the harp out of the concert hall.

Lucy Nolan and Becki Luff formed The Chroma Harp Duo in 2016. The duo’s eclectic style defies the traditional harp sound and stereotype and they are constantly on a quest for new and exciting sounds, regularly commissioning new works from composers and incorporating unusual techniques and objects into their performances to achieve this (from chopsticks to bluetack to castanets!). 

They were finalists in the Wales International Harp Festival and were awarded first prize in the London Camac Harp Ensemble Competition as well as the UK Harp Association’s prize for the best performance of a British work. In her spare time Lucy loves hanging out with her animal pals-so far she has a dog, tortoise and chickens and is hoping to keep expanding the gang! Becki is also a keen plant lover and you will be hard pushed to find her amongst the many many pots in her house!

“Pupils sat together enjoying the shared experience and displaying excellent audience skills (listening, applauding at the end of a piece of music, clapping along when prompted) They particularly enjoyed being able to send questions (via “chat”) which were responded to by the artists within the concert.”

Musical Mondays is a series of live online concerts delivered via Zoom Webinar. We currently deliver this series for schools in Manchester (in partnership with One Education), Merseyside (in partnership with Resonate Music Hub and the Merseyside Hub Alliance) and in Cumbria (in partnership with Cumbria Music Service) as well as in other regions in our SW, NE and Wales branches. The series allows us to bring musicians directly into classrooms, reaching hundreds of pupils every session. During the Covid-19 restrictions, they enabled schools to come together in the virtual world for a shared live experience.

Our concerts reach on average a staggering 2,000+ children.  

The benefits of the series are: 

  • Enabling our musicians to reach a wider audience, providing a quality live music performance to children across the UK. 
  • Increasing music access for pupils in school and at home.
  • Showcasing a variety of musical genres and providing content which could be tied into the model curriculum. 

Feedback from Schools

Feedback from Schools has been extremely positive, with increasing numbers tuning in for each concert: 

  • “It was good for the children to hear music from an instrument they hadn’t experienced before. They enjoyed the different styles of music. They also enjoyed the rain storm as that is what we have been doing in our music lessons this half term.”

     

  • “[The pupils] shared an understanding of how music can help people with neurodivergence.”

     

  • “Children were able to express themselves, it relaxed them, they were focused and enjoyed taking part.”

     

  • “Thank you for the online Musical Mondays sessions, I used it as part of our online ‘homework’ provision. If children couldn’t watch it live I sent a link of the artists on YouTube and asked the children to critique a piece. Thank you for providing this opportunity for young people to access such quality, it’s totally appreciated.”

     

  • “Pupils sat together enjoying the shared experience and displaying excellent audience skills (listening, applauding at the end of a piece of music, clapping along when prompted) They particularly enjoyed being able to send questions (via “chat”) which were responded to by the artists within the concert.”

     

  • “Just a big thank you, being able to access the music concerts has given us something to look forward to and something varied, especially while we are not able to get out and about or have any visitors in.”

     

  • “Pupils were spontaneously dancing, focusing intently on the screen and listening with interest. Some pupils played instruments. It enabled us to come together as a shared experience even though the school was in separate bubbles at the time. We had pupils learning from home and in school and all were engaged. Lovely to see siblings joining in too.”

     

  • “Absolutely love these sessions- such a treat for the class, and they really look forward to them.” 

*Some notes on Zoom:

The concert will be held as a “Zoom Webinar”. This is a very safe way of holding an event online. Only people with the link can see the concert. You will be able to see the musicians but they won’t be able to see you, and you won’t be able to see other people who are watching the concert. You will be able to say hello to the musicians, using the chat function, and ask them questions using the Q&A. To get the most out of the experience, we would recommend that children at home watch the concert with a parent or carer if possible. Following the session, we will send schools some ideas for follow-up activities: these can be shared with parents as well as used in school.