Lomond Sound Traditional Music and Dance Presentation

Lomond Sound’s music and dance presentation is jointly sponsored by the NL Dept of Education and ArtsNL through their School Touring Program and is organized by the Soundbone Traditional Arts Foundation. Their school presentation developed out of the Vinland Music Camp – a traditional music and dance workshop organized by the Foundation. It employs many of the province’s most experienced artists/instructors, collectively known as Lomond Sound.  The program is offered to Newfoundland and Labrador schools free of charge.

The presentation consists of performances and workshops, beginning with a hour-long concert for all grades. During this period each member of the group introduces their workshop activity e.g. singing , songwriting or instrument playing. The opening concert finishes with a question and answer discussion, followed by a closing set of tunes or a song. For the next two periods students are divided into four separate groups for concurrent workshop sessions in singing, songwriting or playing an instrument. (The workshops are rotated after the first workshop so that different groups of students can take part). Depending on the musical experience of the students, the instructors usually start with basic technique, then move on to teaching a simple tune, song or dance which they can perform together. During the first period after lunch students return to their workshop classrooms for two 30-minute sessions during which they rehearse the material covered in the morning workshops.

Lomond Sound’s presentation concludes with a hour-long performance for the entire school. This concert involves students and instructors – and occasionally teachers and community musicians. The final concert is an opportunity for students to demonstrate their newly acquired skills to their classmates. It’s always an exciting and rewarding time for everyone!

Younger students (K-3) often have difficulty holding instruments such as the fiddle and guitar so in smaller elementary schools we accommodate these students by having separate dance, percussion, singing and songwriting workshops for these grades. For larger (all-grade) schools we usually confine the workshops to grades 4-8, though students from the other grades can attend the opening and closing concerts. Along with their sound system, Lomond Sound will bring a number of violins and ukuleles with them to ensure that each student gets an opportunity to play. We usually limit our class size to a maximum of 25 students for instrument workshops, though singing and songwriting can involve up to 35.

At the end of each school visit the group will leave copies of chords sheets and song lyrics that were taught or composed during the day. We also provide an online Folk Arts Resource Guide for the schools so teachers and students can follow up their interest in traditional music and dance. Although the format described is the one we generally use for most of our school tours, we can adapt our program to meet the needs of individual schools.

Lomond Sound makes an effort to teach material that is culturally relevant to the area they are visiting. Lomond Sound performs a cross section of performance styles from around province and strives to make their presentation both entertaining and educational. It has been our experience over the past ten years of touring schools that students are eager to learn more about our province’s folk arts and we believe that our school presentations have helped many young artists find their way.

Sample Daily Schedule (to be adapted to each school’s timetable):

8:00AM – 8:50AM – Lomond Sound arrive and setup in gym

8:50 AM – 9:50 AM – (Period 1) – Opening Concert

9:50 AM – 10:05 AM – Recess

10:05 AM – 11:05 AM – (Period 2) Workshops I  (4 concurrent sessions)

11:05 AM – 12:05 PM  – (Period 3) Workshops II  (4 concurrent sessions)

12:05 AM – 12:55 PM – Lunch

1:00 PM – 2:00 PM – (Period 4) Rehearsals (two half-hour sessions)

2:00 PM – 3:00 PM – (Period 5) – Closing concert