Pupils’ music project is massive hit

Apr 2 2009 by Shirley Bartynek, Hamilton Advertiser

FOR two years, talented youngsters across the county have been remixing and reworking tracks donated by some of Scotland’s top artists.

But it was this week that the young people from Hamilton, Larkhall and Blantyre finally showcased their work at Rutherglen Town Hall.

Generation X, a combined music and new media project in schools in South Lanarkshire, was set up by Brian Docherty.

Brian took his inspiration for GenerationX from the 1970s Langley project, a 60-voice chorus of rural schoolchildren from western Canada, untrained, singing tunes by artists such as the Beach Boys, Paul McCartney and David Bowie.

Brian wanted to take that idea and offer a new perspective, taking it a stage further, by inviting Scottish artists to donate a song from their back catalogue and record a new stripped-down, ‘unplugged’ version.

Artists Del Amitri, Delgados, King Creosote, Garbage, Malcolm Middleton, Teenage Fanclub, Trashcan Sinatras featuring Eddi Reader, Belle and Sebastian, The Bluebells and The Skids were all delighted to take part in the project.

The artists were introduced to a youth group brought together from seven Lanarkshire schools including Calderside Academy, Hamilton Grammar and Larkhall Academy.

The pupils took part in summer schools held in East Kilbride Arts Centre and Rutherglen Town Hall.

The group learned about the songs’ origins, discussed the lyrical content and a little about the artists themselves and over the next eight weeks a series of workshops took place allowing participants to explore and create a new sonic environment for the song.

As producer, Brian collated the group’s ideas and interpreted and arranged a definitive version of the songs.

In keeping with the concept of the process of reworking the artists’ tracks, the finished music was handed over to the video artists in Residence who led the group in moving image workshops in various forms to create new visual accompaniments to complement the tracks.

Councillor Gerry Convery, chairman of community resources, said: “This has been a marvellous project bringing together young people throughout South Lanarkshire with a common interest.

“What a varied and exciting project it has been for all concerned.

“All have worked together with the artists and the music and video artists in residence to produce a final package of 10 newly-mixed tracks accompanied by 10 new music videos together with recorded footage of the original sessions and the documentary of the entire project.

“What a wonderful accomplishment; they should all be extremely proud of themselves as I am for what they have achieved.”

Further info on the project and clips produced can be viewed at www.myspace.com/genxslc.