Good Vibrations was thrilled to be invited to the UK launch of the ASEAN Insight campaign and to celebrate the appointment of Richard Graham MP as Trade Envoy to the ASEAN Economic Community on the 29th September. We put on a chamber Gamelan performance to an invited audience of ambassadors and international business leaders.

The UK-ASEAN Business Council promotes trade between the UK and Southeast Asia, improves understanding of the business opportunities in the ASEAN region and gives practical advice to businesses.

On 9th February we supported 15 teachers at a Barnet primary school to develop their creativity, leadership, communication, problem-solving and team-working skills through a Good Vibrations at Work Team-Building Day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYFjnZ8yHnY

The feedback we got from participants about the day was:

• ‘Stress release; bond with colleagues.’
• ‘Made me think about team work and communication.’
• ‘Great to spend time as a team in a fun way.’
• ‘Enjoyed making music with other staff. Great to sit down and lose myself in the sound.’
• ‘Collaborative, creative, inclusive and non-threatening.’
• ‘Totally different from anything else we do together.’

Their thoughts on Malcolm, our facilitator:

• ‘Brilliant. Very clear and guiding in a safe and fun environment.’
• ‘Enjoyed his passion and enthusiasm.’
• ‘Excellent – really lovely teaching style.’
• ‘A highly motivating person.’

They said it had given them ideas to apply in their work to do with ‘listening and directing’, using ‘different mediums to communicate’ and ‘allowing a group to find its natural creativity without interfering too soon.’

Do get in touch with us (07535 145 797 or katy@good-vibrations.org.uk) if you’d like to find out more about having one of our Good Vibrations at Work days in your workplace.

Dr. Jennie Henley’s article discussing musical development and positive identity change in prisoners (drawing on Good Vibrations in th UK, the Oakdale Prison Choir in the US and the Casa da Musica programme in Portugal) is now published on the EU Access to Culture Platform: http://www.access-to-culture.eu/upload/Docs%20ACP/ACPELPublication2013.pdf

We’re absolutely thrilled to announce that Bill Bailey has come on board as our new patron.

Comedian, actor and musician, Bill Bailey has been one of Britain’s most influential celebrities of the 21st Century. With an eclectic career spanning three decades, he had a long-running captaincy on Never Mind the Buzzcocks, a breakthrough role in the ‘Black Books’ TV series in 2000, and was voted The 7th Greatest Stand-up Comic by Channel 4 in 2000 and 2010.

An accomplished musician and composer, “Bill Bailey’s Remarkable Guide to the Orchestra”, had nationwide success in 2009 and used humour and popular music to make the orchestral world more accessible. He is passionate about environmental issues and has made recent documentaries, such as “Baboons with Bill Bailey” and “Bill Bailey’s Jungle Hero”.

We are honoured that Bill agreed to become our patron in 2014, given his long-standing support of our work. Of Good Vibrations, Bill says:

“I think it’s a fascinating and worthwhile project … many aspects of it strike a personal chord with me. I have a strong connection with Indonesia – I’ve travelled there for many years and during one of these visits I was taught the basics of gamelan and played with a gamelan orchestra.

I’m drawn to the otherness of it, the strangeness and the fact that playing it is unlike any Western musical form. It ebbs and flows, has no real beginning or end, and while playing it I find the concentration required combined with the rippling sound is akin to meditation. It is relatively easy to start playing and get pleasing results, so I can see how it could provide a sense of achievement.”

Professor Alison Liebling’s presentation at the Sharing Good Vibrations event (back in October – it’s taken a while to get this on here!) was thoughtful and inspiring.  As well as an overview of various studies of arts in prisons (including Good Vibrations) she touched on the incredible power of music to touch and transform people.  She drew on the work of Antony Storr, whose book Music and the Mind, was instantly added to many in the audience’s “must-read” lists.  

As well as outlining the findings of the All Together Now study, in which her team looked at the therapeutic impact of Good Vibrations, Professor Liebling also touched on other studies: the evaluation of the Inspiring Change arts in prisons programme in Scotland, and Shadd Maruna’s evaluation of the Changing Tunes programme.  

Professor Liebling ended her presentation (as did Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, Nick Hardwick, speaking at the same event) by sounding a note of warning about the dangers of evaluating music (and other arts) projects in prisons soley by simple benchmarking or what is mostly easily measurable.  

Professor Liebling runs the Centre for Criminology and Criminal Justice at Cambridge University.  She is widely considered to be one of the country’s top criminologists.  Her work looks at: the moral quality of prison life, the work of prison officers, the management of difficult prisoners, suicide prevention in prisons, and values, practices and outcomes in prison management.  

Gerard Lemos, a highly respected author, prison policy expert and Co-Director of social policy thinktank Lemos & Crane, has a new book out, The Good Prison.

In it he argues that conscience, formed by family relationships and reinforced through community life, is vital to enable “offenders” to move on to more constructive lives and that prison’s crucial role is to help prisoners change how they see themselves: simply training for employment will never be enough.

The book includes a study of Good Vibrations.  Gerard sees our work as an “implausible activity” yet “a powerful therapeutic intervention”. He describes his visit to see Good Vibrations in action at HMP Dartmoor, including talking to some of the participants :

“They mentioned the sense of achievement, benefits to their self esteem, how they felt less stressed when they returned to the cell.  But, above all, they returned time and again to the benefits or listening and working together.  These are two qualities not readily associated with prison life, but essential qualities for life on the outside, in particular in the modern workplace”.

He concludes that unlike so much in prison life:

“a gamelan workshop contains no stigma, no label, just the suggestion of creativity, originality…. and that is isn very short supply among the routines and mundanities of prison life.  The positioning of the gamelan workshop also focuses on capabilities, rather than deficiencies.”

This short “radio programme” was produced by and features interviews with participants in Good Vibrations projects at Whatton Prison.  This programme was produced in-house at the prison and presented at the Sharing Good Vibrations conference in October 2013.  Grateful thanks to Steve Turner, Head of Reducing Reoffending at Whatton, plus all the guys involved in the programme.  We are excited to be running more Good Vibrations courses at the prison during the year ahead.

Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, Nick Hardwick, gave one of the keynote speeches at October’s Sharing Good Vibrations event.  His speech is online here.  In his speech Nick said:

“Having now seen Gamelan workshops in prisons, talked to the workshop leaders, read the academic evaluations and tried it myself, I think the case for the value of Good Vibrations’ work in prisons and the importance of Cathy’s inspiration is made.  And more than that, through my inspections, I see the value of the arts in every prison I go to. “

He quoted Tolstoy on art:

“a means of union among men [and women], joining them together in the same feelings, and indispensable for the life and progress toward well-being of individuals and of humanity.”

adding “I think is a pretty good definition of the rehabilitation we all aspire to”

He explored the reasons why it’s so difficult to get arts projects off the ground in prisons, concluding:

“In a nutshell, like the Victorians, we are in an age where the prevailing view seems to be that rehabilitation can be achieved by the exact application of pseudo-scientific processes and what matters is what can be measured. Of course the processes we want to apply are different but the mindset appears not so dissimilar.

“And that is a real problem for arts projects. By their nature they are difficult to measure, their impact is harder to describe.  But in a world of benchmarking and measurable outcomes, will there still be the time for a tutor to use art to get through to a troubled boy nobody else could reach?  How do you measure the value of the increase in self-esteem in a bunch of women enjoying a Gamelan course? How do you describe the benefits for the safety of a prison when a group of serious offenders enjoy themselves and communicate together in a comedy school project?”

Nick went on to quote  from a speech by Churchill, when  he was Home Secretary, about treatment of prisoners, including the line:

“there is a treasure, if you can only find it, in the heart of every man.”

Nick finished by asking:

“How to find it? that is the question.

“I do not believe you can find it just through offender management programmes and risk assessments. I think for prisoners, like the rest of us, art can unlock the treasures within. You all know the impact a painting, some music, a play can have on you, as audience or participant. Prisoners need the same.”

 Happy New Year to all Good Vibrations friends and supporters!  Here’s a really brilliant short film about the Sharing Good Vibrations event in October.  Thanks to But We Blew It Productions for doing such a great job documenting the event.  A major job, as the event, involving over 200 people, lasted four days (mornings, afternoons, evenings) with nearly 60 sessions in all.

Here’s a short video about the forthcoming Sharing Good VIbrations event, produced and directed by Russ, a Good Vibrations participant, gamelan student, and emerging stand-up comedian.  Thanks also to Alex Odam for excellent filming and editing.