We’re delighted to share our 2015-16 annual report with you, celebrating the successes of the last year. View our 2015-16 Annual Report here

Good Vibrations invites bids to design and build its public website. Bids should be submitted to Katy Haigh via email (katy@good-vibrations.org.uk) by 12pm on Thursday 19th January 2017.

The key messages we want to communicate through our new website are that:

• Good Vibrations can solve problems for other organisations and help them to achieve their goals. Extensive independent research evidences the wide range of positive impacts we’ve made with some of the most marginalised people in society.

• This is an innovative approach, so is likely to yield results when other approaches haven’t. Communal music-making and the unconventional ‘Gamelan’ are at the heart of what we do.

• You can trust us as so many other well-respected organisations and individuals do. We have high-profile supporters and an exceptional reputation in the UK and internationally; particularly in the fields of criminal justice and mental health.

• We could help your organisation now. We’re actively looking to forge new partnerships to transform the lives of even more people with complex needs in challenging circumstances.

• This could improve team-working in your staff teams too. Businesses can support senior staff to develop into high-performing teams through our Good Vibrations at Work days.

For more information on what we’re looking for, and how to apply, read the following brief: Good-Vibrations-Website-Brief-V2.pdf

An overview:

• On Thursday afternoons at Campbell House, Gartnavel Hospital in Glasgow
• Participants welcome to make donations to Good Vibrations

These are the sessions we’ll be running:

• Resonate: Connect (12:30-13:30pm) – Discover the resonant sounds and music of the gamelan instruments. Focus on making choices, building social connections and communication skills. Open to everyone particularly adults with additional support needs and their carers (max 6).
• Resonate: Create (2:00-3.00pm) – Create and improvise music on the gamelan, paying attention to our mental health and wellbeing. Record a CD together over 10 weeks and take part in a performance. Open to everyone (max 12).

To book onto any of the workshops, please call 07791 293352
or email info@good-vibrations.org.uk

How to get to Campbell House
Campbell House is a 10 minute walk from Hyndland train station or the entrance to the hospital on Great Western Road. It is not easy to find on your first visit. To find out where we are, Google “Common Wheel, Music Department” or go to https://goo.gl/maps/W8kKXr1iyY42. Altenratively, contact us and we can send out a map by post or email.

Future Resonate Workshops:

• Throughout 2022 Good Vibrations will be running blocks of weekly Resonate workshops at Campbell House, and an intensive week-long Resonate workshops in and around Glasgow.

Youth Music has funded Good Vibrations to run a series of immersive, day-long Effective Facilitation workshops for music practitioners working with young people in challenging circumstances. On 26th February 2017 we will be running a free workshop in central London (at The Royal College of Music). In the training, practitioners will:

• Immerse themselves in the experience of being a participant in a condensed, typical Good Vibrations course.
• Observe an experienced facilitator modelling a range of facilitation techniques and experience the impact on group dynamics and musical outcomes.
• Have fun and get the opportunity to get to know other practitioners working in challenging circumstances.
• Put on a performance and get to keep a CD of the music created on the day.
• Learn a new skill – to play the Javanese gamelan orchestra!
• Be given new Royal College of Music research on Good Vibrations’ facilitative approach – the theory behind what they experience on the day.
• Come out feeling inspired about the potential of incorporating the new facilitation techniques they’ve learnt into their practice.

Anyone wishing to register their interest should email malcolm@good-vibrations.org.uk ASAP. Places are limited to 20.

Good Vibrations is proud to be a best-practice case study in The National Criminal Justice Arts Alliance’s new guide for those with responsibility for supporting the education, health, wellbeing and reintegration into society of individuals within the Criminal Justice System: https://www.artsincriminaljustice.org.uk/arts-culture-and-innovation-in-criminal-justice-settings-a-guide-for-commissioners/.

‘Arts, culture and innovation in criminal justice settings: a guide for commissioners’ provides practical information and ideas for those wishing to commission artists and arts organisations. It includes details of how to identify providers as well as case studies demonstrating how arts activities can be used to meet the needs of offenders.

Funding from Arts Council England and Creative Scotland is enabling us to run regular Gamelan sessions in London, Glasgow and Nottingham for everyone to enjoy.

Whether you’re young or old, an experienced musician or a novice, this is for you. Get in touch to find out more on info@good-vibrations.org.uk or on 07535 145 797.

A 2016 article about Good Vibrations’ impact in the Journal of Offender Rehabilitation says: “Perhaps most interesting is the finding that the initial positive changes observed in some individuals seem to prompt continued positive change. Indeed, those men whom we were able to make contact with in the community after their release from prison—most of whom had completed the Good Vibrations project at least 12 months beforehand were still reporting positive attitudinal changes that they suggested were prompted by their initial participation in the project … The results from this research highlight how projects such as Good Vibrations may act as a catalyst for future behavioral change for some individuals.”

Please visit this link for more findings http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10509674.2016.1194943. Or email l.caulfield@bathspa.ac.uk to request a copy of the peer-reviewed research.

From the first of August we will be running accessible and inclusive Gamelan workshops at the Royal Conservatoire in Scotland. Funded by Creative Scotland, this project will enable people with learning disabilities, dementia, austistic spectrum disorders and complex needs to learn the Gamelan and experiment with expressive movement and sound beams.

We will also be running open access drop-in Gamelan sessions each week too.

Get in touch to find out more: info@good-vibrations.org.uk.

We are actively on the lookout for new people to join our Board of Trustees this summer; people with significant legal, financial, business development, fundraising, strategic and/or corporate experience.

We are also keen to find people who have been through one of our courses, or who have experienced challenging circumstances of complex needs themselves (e.g. long-term unemployment, imprisonment or homelessness) to join the Board.

Trustees volunteer their time, and attend 4 meetings a year. Their travel expenses are reimbursed. See who is already on our Board at https://www.good-vibrations.org.uk/about-us/board-members.

If you’re interested, our Executive Director, Katy, would love to meet you for an informal conversation as a first step. You can reach her on katy@good-vibrations.org.uk or by calling 07535 145 797.

We’re recruiting for a Keep In Touch Program Co-ordinator volunteer to support us to get even better at supporting participants once they complete courses. This is a 3-month placement and we’re ideally looking for someone who can volunteer weekly on Wednesdays in central London.

We hope you’ll get something in return: satisfaction, contacts, friends, charity sector experience, skills development, and an enhanced CV. Expenses will be covered, as per our Volunteer Policy.

We’re looking for someone with strong IT, time-management and communication skills. Someone self-motivated, reliable and focused, who’s good at multi-tasking, has good judgement and ideally has some research experience.

If you’re interested, email malcolm@good-vibrations.org.uk and check out: https://www.good-vibrations.org.uk/about-us/annual-report-and-accounts