Music
Coorie Doon
North Edinburgh Arts Centre
Keith Bruce
four stars
Give the young women of the Pregnancy Cafe and the Bump to Buggy Group in North Edinburgh the opportunity to become songwriters, and the posturing on television's X-Factor and its ilk starts to look very tame indeed. That's what happened when Enterprise Music Scotland, which also funds local chamber music societies and develops young chamber music groups, teamed up with Circle Scotland's Haven Project to work with pregnant women and young mums on ten new lullabies.
Actually, some of the songs the women had composed working with composer Rachel Drury and lyricist Ciara MacLaverty were not sleep-inducing at all. Caroline Roy and her partner John McKay's Calvin's Song imagined their new son in an AC/DC Babygro, referenced Highway to Hell and sounded a little like Teenage Fanclub. But then this was a celebratory daytime project, designed to help the young mums bond with their newborns as well as realise their own latent talent. Others in the group chose to hymn all of their children: Malgorzata Kalan's Noah and Sarah's Song incorporating some words of her native Polish in the verses.
She was bold enough to perform her song live at the culmination event, singing to the backing track as she had done in the North Edinburgh Arts Studio above the cafe. Donna Ganson's song for baby Luke had the live accompaniment of Helen McVey on cello and Ysla Robertson on violin, while Sam Turner's tune for the unborn Alfie, with its memorable chorusline, "You can be my masterpiece", was heard only on playback. All ten tunes, however, featured on a CD the women now have to play at home after eight weeks of work that could and should be replicated in communities across Scotland.
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