An archival film and music project will take place at Dartington in February when the South West Music School will compose soundtracks to six short films from the Dartington Trust archive.
The project is called Old/New, when the musicians aged between 10 and 18 from the virtual South West Music School will work in groups of five, to compose new soundtracks to six specifically produced short archive films under the guidance of Miguel Mera, Head of Film Composition at the Royal College of Music.
South West Music School provides a whole package of specialist educational support consisting of mentoring, individual tuition and residential projects. And its February residential project is at Dartington Hall in Totnes, when the students will get their teeth into music for film for the Old/New project.
The musicians may already be a budding composer or may have never written out a note of their own music in their life, but they will be split into groups of mixed instrumentation and experience and asked to compose music to accompany a silent film.
The films have been supplied by Dartington Hall Trust from their collection of archived films. These archives date back to the 1920s and document important happenings from across the South West region right though to the 1970s. Events such as weather patterns and change in geography of the South West have been documented and stored as well as original footage of the Exeter blitz and the bombing of Exeter Cathedral. Dartington Hall was at the centre of the whole modern documentary movement of the time and this has subsequently created one of the first real film archives in the world.
The students will spend the weekend at Dartington Hall working with international film composer Miguel Mera, creating their own unique sound track to these phenomenal films. There will then be two showings of their work, performed by the students themselves. These will be in the Barn Cinema on Sunday, February 22 at 5pm and 6pm and are free of charge.
This will be an opportunity to not only see these students perform their own compositions but also to witness the showing of films of the local area that have remained unseen for the best part of 40 years.
Tickets for February film showings must be booked in advance. Contact The Barn Box Office.
Posted by Cptn
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