Talk about rewarding...

I’ve been considering this blog for over 24 hours and have only just been brave enough to sit down and write it.  Why? You might ask…what’s so difficult about this weeks blog, you write one every week?  I think it’s the challenge of trying to capture the enormity of something that on the surface of things probably seemed quite ordinary.

This weekend the Hepworth, Wakefield celebrated it’s first birthday, it also celebrated having over 500,000 visitors in its first year and added being shortlisted for the arts fund prize to the many nominations and awards it has attained.  This in itself is truly impressive, that Wakefield could be the home of something so significant, so popular and so successful. As someone who gets to work there, who has staged countless performances there, who visits so often it’s easy to take it for granted.

Yesterday Yew Tree Youth Theatre had the privilege of performing in the gallery Two very different performances but each notable for entirely different reasons.  Black Company performed Spirits of the Landscape, a piece directly inspired by the gallery, specifically the stunning paintings of Clare Woods that were exhibited in the Autumn of 2011.  In just half an hour they adapted their performance to fit in gallery 1 safely and artistically accommodating the sculptures that reside there, as the weather stopped us performing in Black Cloud, . Their performance engaged a significant audience, many of whom knew nothing of our work.  Not only did new recruits to the youth theatre take the time out to come and see it, bringing their families with them.  Not only did much younger members of the youth theatre arrange to be brought to see the Black Company’s work but after the performance ended complete strangers approached me with tears in their eyes to articulate their utter amazement that young people could produces something so, “Raw, beautiful and moving.”  Talk about rewarding…

However all this pales into insignificance a little in light of the other performance we offered at the gallery yesterday.  A group of much younger children – the youngest being only 5 years old sang two original works of the very talented composer Cheryl Camm.  Some of them had only joined the group a week ago, some of them had never sung in public before, all of them performed to the best of their ability and were received with the warmest applause.  Two boys made their debuts as rappers…written by the boy stood next to them who was willing them to be successful…However the moment I will never forget is when a little girl called Courtney who had put on her best dress and crimped her hair and who was supposed to be singing with her friend.  When it was clear she would have to sing on her own she managed to stop her tears and hush the entirety of Gallery 10 with her beautiful voice.  After the group had sung I had so many parents approach me wanting to engage their children in music, in drama, in what Yew Tree does…the younger singers had inspired adults to want to offer their children the brilliant thing drama and music offers.

The thing is that the real significance of those performances will have passed many of the people who witnessed them by…and even some of the performers themselves…not me though.  Yesterday has left me with a whole album of memories that I will always treasure…it was just magic!