My 2020 posts on the Rude Mechanicals website - click on the title to read on the Rudes blogpage…
IF SECRETS COULD TALK BY MAEDB JOY
Making music with people at last (live!.. sort of)
I’ve just spent a few days making music at Guildhall School of Music & Drama with some friends for a theatre project. Kevin Matthews (erstwhile drummer with Rude Mechanicals) spotted a call for musicians to help finish a student project at Guildhall and got in touch around a month ago. He invited Rotten Bliss (Jasmin), Edmond Davie and myself to join him and writer/performer Maedb Joy to create live sound-design for her solo piece If Secrets Could Talk. We were sent a summary and script.
“Using spoken word, monologue and film it will investigate the rise of survival sex work induced by the governments Universal Credit system… a mix of poetry/monologue, music will be used to add tension and atmosphere…”
It’s powerful, mixing humour and tragedy in a way that is sometimes uncomfortable, but always compelling.
Interrupted by events - it should have been performed with a live audience back in May - it was decided to film it using students and equipment from Guildhall’s Production Arts programmes. After just two sessions in which we got to know each other, devised the soundtrack and rehearsed it we went into a full theatre space and recorded. I’d forgotten how much time you spend just sitting around in theatre work, while the tech is sorted everything is checked. we arrived at 9.00AM sharp Monday and once in the space everything moved at it’s own pace. For a change technical problems were left to someone else, there was no anxiety about turnout, no keeping an eye on stage times (“…When the hell are they getting off stage? At this rate we’ll only have 20 minutes!”), no worrying about how much a delay was costing in studio time, no worries about sound: it was all someone else’s problem.
We did five or six runs with recordings of the music and shots for different angles, it’s being edited together and should be ready to view in a few weeks time… It was amazing how quickly we got going and how well it all gelled, especially as Kevin and I were the only ones who had worked together before, but it just felt like we had been playing as a unit for years. More recording soon and perhaps an invite to guest with Miss Roberts, Kevin and myself on the forthcoming Rudes platter I think!
