National Centre for Early Music

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All Aboard



All Aboard is a creative music project, which uses Apollo Ensemble technology to engage very young children, aged 2-5 years old, in musical composition through play and storytelling.

Music4U's famous Melody Monkey character tells a story that takes her on a musical journey, encountering different sounds and landscapes on the way, in order to guide  these young musicians through an exploration of the technology, which is embedded within soft play equipment. Children are then encouraged to use the sounds from these stories, as well as their own imaginations, to create new soundscapes and compositions.

All Aboard is designed to provide early years children with:
  • hands-on access to musical building blocks
  • opportunities to learn about and make decisions on structure
  • chances to learn and develop turn-taking
  • skills in recognising and creating patterns
  • opportunities to practice starting/stopping at appropriate points
  • the chance to follow a leader and be a leader themselves
  • a sense of ownership and pride in their work

The project, led by NCEM Education Consultant Cathryn Dew, has already visited several early years settings in the York area. All Aboard is currently being delivered as a three-session pilot project in St Paul's Nursery in York and Lincoln Gardens Primary in North Lincolnshire, led by community musicians Rebecca Gross and Chris Bartram, with support from students on the University of York's MA in Community Music. Following this pilot phase, Music4U will lead an evaluation of the project and will establish best practice for future work through a report that will be available here in Autumn 2013.