well, good morning still, I think, and welcome. My name is Liam McArthur, I am one of the deputy Considering Officers here in the Scottish Parliament, it's my pleasure to be hosting this morning's event and I also welcome you to the 19th Festival of Politics here in your Scottish Parliament. We are delighted that you can join us today and part of this in conversation event with Dame Everlyn-Glenny OBE. It is brought to you in partnership this year with the Edinburgh International Festival and later I will be inviting you to participate in this in conversation with questions or comments that you wish to make. Let me get on with introducing our guest. Dame Evelyn Gleney-Obee is the first person in history to create and sustain a full-time career as a solo percussionist, performing worldwide with the greatest orchestras and artists. She grew up on a farm in the northeast of Scotland, and was influenced by Scottish traditional music. ac mae'n rhaid i rhaid i gael gwneud o Orkney, ac rhaid i gael gwneud i gael gwneud o Orkney am hollgol, ac mae'n rhaid i gael gwneud yn fawr i gael gwneud. Dame Everlands' gael hyn yn ddeglindig adeiladau ac mae'n rhaid i gael gwneud i'w hirthfyrdd ac mae wedi gael gwneud i'w percwsion i ddegol 12. Ieol, mae'n rhaid i gael gwneud hynny dda chi i gael gwneud i gael gwneud i'w hollgol a chweinwyr cynnwys, a'r bydfaeth a'r llwythau i'r mynd i'w gael ei ddweud. Felly, mae'n mynd i ddau'r rydw i'r ddweud y gwaith. Mae'n ganddo'r cyfle oedd oedd yr Aelodau Rhaid Llywodraeth i Llywodraeth i Llywodraeth i lŵn i'w of 16, oedd mae hi'n dweud o percusiwn a piano. Mae hi rywbeth i'r holl o'r percusiwn yw'r orchestr i ddim yn ddefnyddio unrhyw gennych o percusiwn. Evelin yn ei gael'r orchestrau o'r percusiwn yn gyffredinol i'w percusiwn, oedd mae hi'n ddiwedd i'r percusiwn i'r holl o'r promys yma the Royal Albert Hall in 1992. Having recorded over 40 solo recordings and composed 200 pieces of music for various films, TV shows and theatre productions, she has won over 100 international awards and is a double Grammy winner and a BAFTA nominee in 2012. She collaborated with director Danny Boyle in performing as part of the Olympic Games opening ceremony leading 1,000 drummers as part of the performance and featuring the new instrument, the Glenny Concert Allu Phone, one of 3,500 percussion instruments that form part of the Evelyn Glenny Collection. Dame Evelyn was awarded an OBE in 1993 and this year was announced as the winner of the prestigious Leone Sunning Music Prize for 2023 with previous recipients including Igor Stravinsky and Yehudi Menuin. This is the first time the award has been presented to a percussionist. Dame Evelyn is present of the Help Musicians, a charity that has supported UK musicians for over a century now, as well as being patron and a supporter of many charities including Music and Hospital in Arts, Drake Music Scotland and Edinburgh Youth Orchestra to name but a few. Some of these charities, I'm delighted to say, are represented here in Parliament today. Her unsteinting support for young people continued in 2021 when she became Chancellor of Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen. She's also founded the Evelyn Glenny Foundation, which continues her mission to teach the world to listen. As I said, there will be an opportunity for you to put your own questions and make your own comments later on. I might start, Dame Evelyn, by returning to the theme of the application process to the Royal Academy. You obviously changed the way in which that application process worked that nobody could be rejected without first being given an opportunity to be heard. I just wonder what impact both that challenge and the fact that you overcame that challenge had on the 16-year-old Evelyn Glenny and the legacy of that for you personally going forward. First of all, thank you very much indeed for the opportunity for me to be here and to have this discussion. I'm delighted to receive any thoughts and feedback along the way. I think that the thing about being young is that a lot of things can be very simplified in your mind. My aim at that point was to be the best possible percussionist I could be. What I didn't know growing up in the north-east of Scotland was what was my level in relation to the rest of the country as far as being a percussion player. All I could give was the best I possibly could. What was very clear in my mind—this is all about listening to yourself—is what do I want to do? What do I want to do? I want it to be a solo percussionist. The aim was really simple. When I auditioned, I felt I gave the best I possibly could. However, I was expecting the result to be unique to reach a higher level. If that was the case, I would know exactly what I would have to do in order to try to be a bit better the next time around. However, when you have the feedback that, yes, you are reaching the level, but we cannot take you in because of your hearing, then I have an issue. Where does this stop? If someone plays good enough to get in and they have no arms and legs or are blind or whatever the case may be, who is judging this? It is a very dangerous landscape to be. We are dealing with a profession that is all about connection and building bridges. The whole profession belongs to all of us. It belongs to all of us while we are in our mother's womb. It belongs to all of us when we are taking our last breath and every part in between of our lives. That is what I realised in learning music at school, because we were just busy playing in the community and primary schools and at this community event, at that community event. It made no difference who our audience was. We were giving 100% and we cared about that occasion. This was a really important landscape for me to keep very strong in my mind. Why are you a musician? What are you? What does a musician actually do? In those years, when I was thinking of trying to be the best possible percussionist I could be, I realised this is a never-ending journey. Even this morning at the hotel, I was practising a certain stroke with my drumsticks on the bed, just going back to very, very basics, practising this, because I've just got this desire to try to improve. However, then I realised, what am I? I'm a musician, so my language is dealing with sound.  That's absolutely fine, so you can't really control that. People do recognise if you give the most honest performance. I think that this was so important when I was auditioning, was for the panel to really listen to the individual. They could not be in a position where they could think, well, an orchestra won't hire a hearing-impaired musician. They don't have a right to say that, so I will take care of that. However, as it happens, I wanted to be a solo percussionist, so it was almost like a double whammy for them. I felt that it was important to say something. Am I of the standard to get in? Yes or no? The answer was yes, so that came back from them. Therefore, I must get in. It's as simple as that. I must get in. You have to allow somebody to have that place if they've reached the standard to get in. It was just like simplifying the whole situation. It took one man on the panel who recognised that they were on dodgy ground here. They asked me back for a second edition that had nothing to do with percussion playing at all. It was completely unprepared. It was sitting at the piano, looking at sight reading, looking at a score deciding who might have written that piece of music, doing choral reading, full-score reading, transposition, you name it, every aspect of being a musician. I was used to that already. At the end of that, they said, you can start in September, and they realised that they have to listen to the individual, not what they see, but what is it with that individual? It's more than also just the playing. How might that individual fit in? What is it that they've got to just zone in on that individual and use all the senses possible to connect with that individual? It's a very interesting circumstance. For me, as a performer, I hone in to my audience. It isn't just transferring what I've practised in the privacy of my own four walls and plonking that on stage at the usher hall or the hub or wherever it might be and hoping that the audience might enjoy this. It's really grasping who is here right now, what is the message that we want to put forward right now, and always thinking about the present and being adaptable enough to recognise what the situation is right now. That is really important. That is what happened at the audition for that panel to zoom in but also zoom out. From that, they realised that they have to just see people as people. What is that passion in that person? Hearing you explain that now, it all makes perfect sense. It's recognising, though, that that was your thought process at the age of 16, which, for many people of that age, can be quite a difficult challenging time. They're dealing with lots of things going on in their life, but you seem to have a real confidence, a kind of inner strength, a self-confidence. I don't know whether that came from the fact that you had been brought up playing, performing music. We were discussing this before we came in about the skills that that does give young people that ability to perform in public. Have you also talked about an inclusive environment in the north-east of Scotland at the time, being a more inclusive community? Did that give a confidence to you as a young person? Yes, I think that it was a bit of everything, to be honest. The whole ethos of the school that I went to, which was Ellen Academy just north of Aberdeen, was that the school believed that every child has a story to tell, and every child does have a story to tell, actually. Within that school, you've got a great engineer, a great politician, a great musician, sports person, debater, baker, plumber, electrician, whatever it might be, and it's up to the school to plant seeds, but to also fish out what it is in that individual and to then be able to support that in the conversations that are had and how interested you are in that individual. Suddenly, you have to become an expert in baking or an expert in engineering or something. It's just simply being interested enough to listen to that person. I'll never forget that at school I wasn't particularly hot on maths, for example, but my teacher happened to be a very good pianist, and he could see how I became a different specimen almost in the music department. Therefore, he just changed his vocabulary in the maths class, and that made all the difference. It was just a simple thing like that. It may not have been so simple for him, but he did it. It's just this kind of paying attention, and that's what listening is. It's just paying attention to the circumstance. I think that's why social media is quite difficult to handle because you say something, but then you're not actually listening to what you're saying. You've just written it, and then it's there. That's a whole different meaning to listening. Yes, I just felt that the school wasn't about finding the best musicians, but what is it about playing music that gives that person satisfaction? What difference does it make in their lives? I really feel that music, in a way, participating in music, whether it's a listener, whether it's actually playing an instrument, whether it's discovering sound for the first time, and thinking about foley and soundscapes and all sorts of things, belongs to us all. It really does, and so that's an extension of our imagination, but also it's an extension of our whole physical body. Often we draw upon music at the time of crisis, and suddenly we have to provide music here, provide music there in order to save a situation, but actually if music is part of our lives right from the beginning, and if we can just find this route where we really do recognise how important it is to our wellbeing, to all the physical aspects, our balance, our co-ordination, everything that we are giving to ourselves, it's really quite amazing the offshoots of music. Also, when you think of music, music consists of practically every subject that a child studies at school, so you're thinking about history, you're thinking about geography, you're thinking about maths, you're thinking about language, you're thinking about technology, you're thinking about acoustics and architecture, you know, you're thinking about all sorts of things when you actually dissect music. One of the projects that we have been developing over the past few years is a project called Sounds of Science that was rolled out throughout the Shireland academies in Birmingham, and this is just looking back at, you know, the history of man-developed sounds. So, you know, you start, let's, you can start anywhere, but you start maybe in this case with stone tool making, so you clunk stones together and you scrape stones and then a little spark happens and that then ignites fire, so what happened then with fire? So you can create the foley sound, the feel of fire by just scrunching plastic bags or something, and then what did fire mean to the development of man? Well, we could suddenly cook meat on there, or we could keep warm and all sorts of things, and it goes on and on, so the sound of helium, the sound of Dolly the sheep, the sound of the bicycle bell, the sound of, I don't know, penicillin, the sound of gravity, the sound of the first computer, the sound of silent movies, whatever, so really looking at history and thinking, well, what else was happening when this event occurred?  We don't think, well, what was going on in China? What was going on in Latin America? So this project is really zooming out and thinking, well, historically, what was happening there? What other inventions were happening? You know, all sorts of things like that, so a five-year-old can deal with this project along with an 18-year-old, so they're talking about the same project through Signs of Science, but dealing with all different aspects of their education. That's what I enjoy really, building the bridges there. Which just underscores the extent to which music or sound can be woven through everything.  For those who haven't watched them, I thoroughly, thoroughly recommend them, but you talk about music as being almost a daily medicine and obviously a requirement for everybody in some shape or form. Do you think it's something that we are doing well enough? I mean, there's an awful lot of onus that's always placed on schools and there's a limit to what schools can do, but with the contraction often of extracurricular activities for one reason or another, the capacity to pick that up out with school is limited. Are there things that we could be doing better or that you see we're doing well and that we might look to roll out more widely across the country? Absolutely. I mean, we as a country, as a whole, we've had a very good record, I would say, of amateur music making, of community music making, of music in our schools, of professional music making and so on. It's been very, very strong. Absolutely there have been challenges right across the board, no question about that. But things can't remain the same forever more. Music is like a river, it's always flowing and we always have to ask the question, as the festival is asking now, where do we go from here? We can't just sit back and think, oh, that's working fine, that's great. I think that we have always got to communicate with our young people, we have always got to communicate with those who are providing the services and make sure that communication is happening at all times in whichever ways possible. So keeping those avenues open is so incredibly important. I think that we can definitely look at our demographics and think about all the different situations that people require support. So we might think about music when mums are pregnant, for example. So how important is that going to be, not just for the baby but for the parents? What about keeping that extension going once the baby is born? What about music in preschools? A lot of the questions that we get asked is, what should primary schools buy as regards to percussion in the budget, with the budget that they might have? Now, very often you'll find that schools have rattles and tambourines and shakers and all of this sort of thing. They're all high-frequency instruments. They're all things that often don't have a long sustain. So the recommendation is think of food, think of sound like a diet. So how much low frequencies do you have? How much mid frequencies do you have? How much high frequencies do you have? So you're nurturing the senses for a young person through sound and through that sound diet. So thinking about short and long sounds. They're already engrossed with very high, cosmetically enhanced sounds through phones and computers and other devices in the home. So the last thing they need are more sounds up in this register of the body. So really thinking about that, what sort of low sounds can we bring into their soundscape and so on. So thinking about it like that, thinking about sounds in the whole medical profession, we think about the colour of the walls, we think about the seats we sit on but do we actually think about the soundscapes? So really communicating with our architects, for example. So a lot of the schools for the deaf, for example, that are being built now, the new schools have curved corridors where you're not suddenly spooked by someone coming round a corner or the dining areas designed in ways where you're not getting the scraping and the cutlery and all sorts of things, which is very, very painful often for deaf people. And again it's just understanding people's circumstances and how we can really improve all of our situations as far as we can. But I think the thing for me as a youngster was having those opportunities to perform. I think that that was so important going into primary schools to perform, going into homes for the elderly to perform, going into any kind of situation, you know, the Ellen show or something and playing outdoors in the square. It didn't matter. It was a chance to perform because it isn't just the performance, it's the organisation, you know, so it's making sure you've got everything ready, you're there, you're mentally ready to go, you've got your colleagues to think about. It's more than just striking that drum. And so that sense of responsibility and willingness and sharing this responsibility and having a chance to talk about it afterwards. And that's all part of the performance as well. I think any opportunity we can to perform and really using our spaces, you know, as far as possible, and this is something that certainly was ignited post pandemic, you know, it's absolutely, you know, the world is our stage, that is, that's that we perform, you know, as long as we're alive, we perform. I'm going to open this up to questions in a second, but just one further question for me at this stage. You talk about the importance of listening and perhaps critical of the fact that we don't properly listen. I'm conscious we're sitting in this parliamentary chamber as one of the deputy presiding officers, but also as one of the participating MSPs in debate. I think I can testify to the fact that very often or too often we don't listen even when we're engaged in the debate. But I wonder if you could maybe talk a little bit more about what you consider to be important in terms of properly listening, whether it's to sound or whether, as you were saying before, in a social media context, actually listening to what it is that others are saying. Well, I think first of all, for me anyway, listening starts from within. So, you know, it's important to listen to your inner chatter and to give yourself that space and time to listen to yourself, and that often sounds quite selfish, but it's a really necessary activity. It really, really is, just to have that moment of listening to yourself. Now, it might be that, you know, you don't have an agenda or anything like that, it's just quite simply, you know, being with yourself. And I find that's really necessary for me because, you know, you're pulled in all different directions and you have all sorts of things coming your way. But ultimately, it's going back to that 16-year-old. What is it that this individual is listening to? And what is it that makes this individual, you know, really say something? And we can all say something. That's the thing. So, you know, please don't think this is a kind of ego trip or anything like that for us. This is necessary for us all to do. And I think that once, in a way, you've silenced yourself to allow this listening to happen, you can then build that bridge and energy to listen to someone else or to a circumstance. And, you know, when I'm in my practice room, you know, I might be striking something and thinking, right, how do I want to link that to that? And I may spend ages thinking how do I want to link that to that? And there could be 100 different ways of linking that to that.  You know, at the end of the day, who cares? But actually, it is the difference between feeling something or not feeling something, a feeling that that care has been taken or not taken. So just boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop. You know, what is it that you want to say? And people will feel that. And listening really is feeling, you know. It isn't about a sound. It isn't about whether you can hear something or not hear something. It is literally about deciding that you want to be in the presence of that situation and receive, you know, and then you'll be able to give, receive, give, receive, give. So, you know, if I only spent time with my left hand, then this will give up, you know. So everything has to work together and that's what listening is as well. So imagine if we were having this, when I keep striking this, imagine I was having a conversation with you right now and I had my mobile phone here. Just if I had my mobile phone, how would that change the conversation? If I had my mobile phone and I just- You wouldn't be the first. But it makes the difference. It just makes the difference, you know. And this is the thing, is, you know, can you imagine if I gave a performance and my mobile phone was on the music stand, you know, and as the orchestra was playing and I had maybe 10 bars or something, and I just, you know, how on earth would the audience feel? But yet we feel we can do that with a conversation, you know. And I would just ask if for one day we could pop our mobile phones away whenever we have a conversation and just see, just observe. It may or may not make any difference to you, but just observe if it does and what that difference might be and is it something that we can cultivate. So when I practice, I'm 100 per cent there. If I'm looking at my mobile phone, that is the activity I'm doing, not also whilst I'm practicing. So it's just teeny little things like that that I think would help to make a difference. I wonder what your 16-year-old self would have said to the putting away of the mobiles for the entire day. It's time to receive and give, open up questions to the audience. If you could raise your hand, that will allow broadcasting to turn on your microphone. You don't need to do anything but the microphone should come on. There'll be a little red light near the tip of it. If I could ask that questions be reasonably succinct, then hopefully we can get in everybody that wants to ask a question or make a comment. So who's going to get us under way? Gentlemen, they are in the blue shirt four rows back. Thank you. My name's David Elliott. I'm chairman of Edinburgh Youth Orchestra. I agree, Evelyn, with so much you say about music making in this country, professional music making. I've left a youth orchestra this morning of 92 who are working hard to practice, to prepare for concerts, given up a week of their holidays. I am optimistic about youth music, but I also have this slight doubt that we are persuading the people who make the decisions of the value of music in the curriculum. I wonder if you think there are things that we could be doing more as musicians to persuade the politicians and the people who make the decisions of the value of music for all our young people. So what could we be doing to persuade politicians to be doing more to support music in this country? I don't think we necessarily have to just land it all on the politicians or I'm not just saying that because you're here actually, but actually this belongs to us all. It's all of our responsibility and I think that it doesn't also or it shouldn't also land on the plates of the musicians because the musicians are already passionate, musicians are already doing a lot to be honest and there's only so much we can do and I think that it would be great to get other disciplines involved to talk about the power of music, the power of sound and how important it is. So looking at it from a medical point of view, looking at it from a sports point of view, what is it let's say in the world of sport that makes music important to what they do and the level that they do it etc etc and looking at many many different kinds of disciplines, I think it would be great if we could have conversations together so that we really learn from each other because of course we are dealing with music in so many different situations and it's very difficult when you see the Edinburgh Youth Orchestra with such talented players, they are dedicated players, many will go on to be professional musicians so you know they already know what they're going to be doing or want to do and so on so they're giving the audience who's already passionate about music and it could be their families and so on wanting to support them so you've got that enthusiastic environment already but how can we extend that and I really do feel if we can get the different disciplines involved then that might really help us so you know I've seen this obviously in the deaf community where you know we went from when I was growing up where there's no way you could put deafness and music together because people assumed that deafness was about silence, music is about sound so there's no way they can meet in the middle well of course all of this has changed you know it really has and how important music is to deaf people and technology is also played apart in that so here you know we're talking about technology you know we're talking about people's perceptions of disability and there's all sorts of things all sorts of disciplines and people and organisations and communities that can come together and have this kind of conversation of what why is music so important in our lives you know and and not just have it the responsibility of the politicians or musicians and so on I feel quite strongly about that really thank you very much right gentlemen the front row in the jacket yeah thank you I'd like to just develop a point that David was mentioning a moment or two ago my name's Alasdoror and I'm a brass instrumental teacher in Stirling a wee quick good word for politicians if I may thanks to after a 10-year campaign roughly in this place in 2021 the Scottish Parliament removed fees for instrumental tuition being charged by local authorities up and down the country from Shetland to Gretna that was a major step after 10 years of hard slog getting to get politicians to realise that this was a barrier to the sort of participation that you were talking about at the beginning Evelyn but one of the main hangovers from that is and what David I think is getting at is that in 2007 there were 1264 instrumental and vocal teachers working in Scotland schools today there are 615 so we've removed a big barrier in terms of cost but we've got a lot of work to do which won't be done overnight to try and up the the teachers that are available to teaching schools and second quick point where do we go from here well we where we go from here is what we saw in the usher hall last night with the budapest festival orchestra and what they showed the future of perhaps orchestral concerts could be it was amazing I see Nicola Bedi and Eddie sitting behind me here I say a massive thank you to her in the end of the festival for organising it and if you've not got a ticket for the budapest festival of orchestra for the next couple of nights beg borrow or steal one because you need to hear them thank you excellent thank you very much indeed plugs are are are also permissible is there something that we can perhaps do in terms of that point around and the teaching profession that is able to to deliver the instrumental tuition both in schools and probably out with schools as well is there more that we can be doing there yeah I mean we've definitely seen a decline as you'd say in the in the instrumental teaching and we've perhaps got to balance this out where obviously we're seeing a huge increase in people dealing with music through technology so a lot of our are actually incredibly creative composers and writers for media music and computer games and film music and and so on are often people who don't actually play a musical instrument but they're incredibly versatile and creative with technology and are creating amazing music scores actually and often then and I'm seeing this myself where those types of people are then coming to musicians who play instruments to to to work together not in all cases so I think we're seeing this real rise in people who are navigating through technology and doing incredible things so I think this is just part of the progression that we're experiencing so although we're seeing a bit of a gloomy picture in one sense but there's also this creative streak that is happening even if it's not being transferred to the concert hall because it's not that type of thing that that can be easily planted on a on a stage but I also think that during the pandemic there was a huge amount of online resources that were being creative and that have continued thankfully post pandemic that allowed young people to access some of those things I just thought were absolutely incredible and thankfully they're being supported now to keep going because they can see the the value of this so that kids have things to to access both school access with their families and so on and they're getting professional people to contribute to these things as well and that's all good so again that's with the help of technology that's allowing this to happen we can connect with all sorts of people on a global basis as regards to these online facilities and again that was heightened during the pandemic so I found myself doing things in primary schools in the middle of nowhere in America for example online and that was fantastic you know because there's no way I probably would have gone there in person you know if we even if we didn't have the pandemic you know I just probably wouldn't have gone there but it was possible to to access these places and that was really really great so I think you know we've we've always got to balance these things there's always a ying and yang to everything but I think how we use our spaces where it's appropriate for one person two people three people four people to perform that that's that's a good thing you know it doesn't always have to be at the the usher hall for example but I think you know where there's a way there's a will I really feel that and and I think that it's very important that professional musicians like myself you know talk about the importance of playing an instrument that isn't just all about performing that instrument so what is the process of learning a musical instrument and what does that do you know in our particular journey so it doesn't always have to end up on a platform that's really really important so you know for example one of my brothers learned trombone at school he started when he's 12 and he left school at 16 17 whatever and he stopped playing then but those few years were just incredibly valuable to him as a person and he's never picked the trombone up again but that doesn't matter it's what did it mean and then what was the impact of that with him moving forward and and he still talks about it so there you go you know and I think that's really important and he talks about it where you know he will go to a concert or he will you know sort of put money if somebody's busking somewhere or whatever it is so it's just nurturing that right from the get go and and and thinking you know everybody has their own take on on on being involved with music that point about digital creativity can make me think that it may not be long before having your mobile phone on your music stand is entirely legitimate and and this is it you know and and that's the thing is that you know although I don't like to see a mobile phone you know on a music stand but there could be an aspect of that that actually does lead into the creative side in what we do musically so I have to be open enough to think you know how that how that could be but at the moment if it's a case of you know just scrolling through instagram or something that doesn't that doesn't sit well with me I've got another question in the front row here oh i'm brandish Christian good to bet you for real thank you for helping me through COVID I think you're all right uh music, poker, bogey, hard of being I've always always wanted to do music live but never got time to do music through any sort of school or COVID perfect but yeah partly what you're doing disabled people you have to be creative like everywhere else in society people with learning disabilities as well I've been thinking to participate in people all over here and there disabled learning music a brilliant thing to help people through their life and it can come back that person and we should all learn dynamic, play as L, A, S, L, whatever through any time we could all be equal like music team time it's all our work not only for hearing not being a banks of science it's for deaf as well and disabled we're all together and uh absolutely yes exactly thank you for that for that um for your thoughts there I think you're absolutely right that music does belong to us all and I think that's why I feel very strongly about nurturing music right I mean as soon as we you know are in this world um and in a way you know it's whether we're asking that the the question of music or sound because obviously music is is about sound and and it stems from sound um but it stems from presence as well you know music has to start from a space um so it has to start from you know that that's where it's it starts and then we build on that and uh and I think that you know as you say that it belongs to us all and and how we relate to that um is something that we have to be able to express so you know it isn't always about finding the next lang lang on the piano or something it is what does music mean to me what does sound mean to me and sometimes when we think of sound it it could be I mean I don't know you know what we often ask um what rhythm do you like what's your favorite rhythm what's your favorite piece of music what's your favorite composer or something but do we actually ask what's your favorite sound you know I don't think we do really what is our favorite sound so for me I really like low sounds I love the bass drum sound you know much more than a glockenspiel or a symbol or something and that has resonance you know I just feel it is something velvody it's something that spans out like this where there's a chance for the body to digest that sound well that's that's me you know for somebody else it may mean nothing at all and that's absolutely fine um but you're right it is always having this platform where we can just reach out to something that is as necessary as food water shelter a roof over our head yes gentleman the second row here I was just wondering what your thoughts are your feelings of connections would be with popular music jazz music rock music I mean are there many people in that world could do what you do or could you swap places with steward copeland for an afternoon or that kind of a thing or would you see your peer group if you're talking about sound your peer group not necessarily being the percussionists but maybe some guy with keyboards who has an awful lot of sounds at his his disposal so could you see the interchangeability I think of of different genres of music so popular popular music jazz etc could you see yourself performing those roles and likewise musicians from from those genres doing what it is that you do I think that for musicians they have to listen to themselves I don't think that you can start to say they should or should not do this or that it a musician just does and feels what they do naturally so if someone wants to specialise in jazz and that's where they feel most at home that's absolutely fine if it's someone's a rock drummer that's absolutely fine a timpanist and an orchestra that's absolutely fine it's recognising what makes them you know really come alive and where their curiosity the natural curiosity might be it's making sure that they all have a platform in order to present what they they do and I think that's the power of festivals really it's a power of something that belongs to the community because the community really likes to reach out to different aspects of music some people like opera some people like classical some people love to see you know a youth orchestra some people like to see a folk group and so on and and you know all of those things need to be celebrated for sure and they're all relevant actually but because we're inclined to say well I like that and I don't like that that's absolutely fine but I think music institutions can really help to bring and build some of these bridges in connection with the different disciplines of music so you know we've seen this a lot with the royal Scottish conservatoire with the traditional music and contemporary music you know it's quite fascinating how these two sort of arms have come together and the kind of new creations that have come about really really interesting I think also musicians are naturally now partly because of social media where they can make these connections directly reaching out to different kinds of musicians and thinking oh you know what might this collaboration look like you know it may not go anywhere but who knows and it's having a chance to explore that um in my own situation you know I've always seen myself as simply a musician my specialty has been solo percussion and having percussion as a spine run through every project um but I haven't seen myself as a classical musician a jazz musician or any other type of musician it's just a musician and that means that you know you can find yourself in these different landscapes um and and feel so actually I fit in here I feel as though I belong in here or I belong enough in order to explore this kind of possibility and I think the longevity of our creativity is about having that platform to explore and always be curious you know if suddenly we're hemmed in or hostage to a situation where people expect us to do something in such a way then that really is is dangerous ground to be on I think we have to allow our young people to know that they can explore so if you know the leader of the edinburgh youth orchestra um wants to team up and and contact you know M&M or or Kate Bush or something let that happen you know see what happens there um or to to do a project with Phil Cunningham let that happen let's see what what's going to happen there it's that to me I find fascinating and that's what I love festivals to really explore are these different kinds of of combinations and and letting this this freedom really really happen um I'm going to go to the lady at the back and then I'll come back to you yes lady in the fourth row hello my name is Zina I'm a drama teacher um I often find that young people are really scared of making mistakes they consume a lot of stories but they don't see themselves as confident story makers so I really encourage them to enjoy their mistakes and learn from them and I wondered what was your best mistakes and what have you learned from them what was your best mistake and what did you learn from it um my best mistake was not a musical one actually um uh no it was when I first bought my first house in uh in or my first flat I should say in in London and I thought that the same system ran up and down the country and that you paid the the the asking price which was the case that that happened in Scotland and uh so that was a big mistake I made but there we go uh you you live and learn but um it's it's interesting I I don't really have any uh regrets big decisions have been made whereby I've been very aware of the consequences so an example of that was uh when for many many years I had uh agents in different parts of the world and they would find concerts for you and so on and uh however you had exclusivity with those agents and also they in those days uh would specialise in concertos and recitals and I wanted to do other things other types of collaborations for example um just other things you know to keep myself buoyant because I was finding myself just going round and round a little bit and so I made a pretty big decision to forgo the agents and just basically manage myself with knowing that there would be far less concerts however there would be the freedom to explore other territories and that's exactly what happened and but it made me a much happier person um and it made me it it created things that would not necessarily have happened but of course this was pre social media and all sorts of things like that so you have to think historically about these things as well now the whole landscape of managing somebody has changed and uh and so we have to now open ourselves up to to you know where we are at at this point in time um but you know this is just a few years ago and so it's an example where things you know are continually changing and changing at quite a quick rate to be honest and so it's very exciting but it gives us all the more reason to listen to our young folk um you know and listen to those who are supporting these people and and really you know having them here as part of a conversation and and what is it that that music means to them you know what is it in their lives that makes them do what they do and how might they see this uh moving forward in their situations how might they see the the industry in 100 years time how might we be listening in 100 years time what will be on our stages in our 100 years time how will be how will be will we be interacting with our um technology our phones and whatever else or will it be something that we're looking at will it be something that we trigger by tapping our head you know or our knee or or whatever we don't know but it's all possible actually you know might just moving my big toe trigger something off we don't know and and it's it's a fascinating time to be in but it's all the more reason to listen to each other does that make it easier to persuade children young people not to be fearful of mistakes that the question being raised that often children are fearful about telling their stories or performing music and how do you allay those fears and allow youngsters just to embrace it it has to be embraced you know this is part the reason why the sounds of science project is important because this is a project that can go on and on and on what is the sound of my community what is the sound of my home what is the sound of my school what is the sound of my journey to school what is the sound of my playground you know what is the sound of my kitchen whatever it might be and and think like what might the sound of my community be in 50 years time or how do i want the sound of my community to be in 50 years time so it's really you know allowing them to have those conversations it's so important those conversations don't always have to come through a musical instrument and then for us to say oh she can play but he can't or you know that's really good but that's that's not really good yeah it's not about that at all you know it's it's what you were saying that it belongs to us all you know in whatever capacity that is it it's a meaningful thing to us all we just have to have that belief that root that opportunity and have that listening platform gentlemen there i've been listening to you listening and listening and it seems to me everything you're saying distills down to one really great idea which is that music brings benefit to us as humans so going on from the question that you just pondered yourself how will we be listening to music in 100 years my question is how important now is that the music is it that music is composed by humans music is how important is it that humans that music is composed by humans in other words oh a i should we embrace it or be terrified this sounds like an old an in conversation all to itself but it is how do we how do we deal with a i do we embrace it do we try to control it what's there well we're we're kind of involved with it already you know i mean years and years and years ago i know that some of my recordings were used and and uses backing tracks for this and that you know without my knowledge and or looped and all sorts of things and and that was quite surprising when it it happened you know and i was fairly you know a bit indignant about it and whatever i think the important thing message i would put forward is that music is about emotion and and that really comes from us human beings it really does so all of the nuances that that comes from music making is that's what makes us unique and it's what makes each one of us you know you can line up 10 snare drums of the same make the same size the same model you name it but have 10 different players playing exactly the same thing and it will be you know that nth of a difference each time and that's special you know that is what's so extraordinary about us so i would always feel that there is space for the human being to compose to create music to connect with music technology will obviously play a part of course it will but i think that there has to be this realization that what we create is valued and protected it has to be protected and it has to be rewarded accordingly people's creativity doesn't just sort of you know it's not there for people to to pick off like you know apples on a tree it has to be acknowledged and and yeah it has to be respected and it's that that is used then as inspiration moving forward you know for the next generation and so on so that's why you know when you see someone play is quite different to even just watching them on the computer i think that's what we missed during the pandemic is that we didn't get this physical feeling of sound you know when you see a violinist play and you just see how that violin is the face is resting on the instrument or the the rosin from the bow or just everything or a percussion player and feeling that sound is is a very different sensation and we need to protect that value that and make sure there's a platform for that always i've got a sneaky hunch we're going to return to this in future festivals of politics in its wider sense right we've probably got time for a couple might be three more questions if the questions are reasonable brief i've got the lady at the second row back and then we'll come to the gentleman in the back row hello and my late father was brought up in the northeast of scotland and he was a body ballad singer he was also a prisoner of war with the japanese during the second world war he died when he was nearly 87 and we were told by somebody who knew him men that when he sang in the camp everybody stopped including the guards and i also believe that you know he was a farmer he sang at his work and i think that was one of the ways that he that helped him to heal in the days when he came back so i think that what you're saying about music being an essential part of our being was very much the thing for my dad absolutely i think that reinforces the point about the daily medicine as well i think doesn't it it's yes it is and i think that is exactly as you said the power of music is that it can be placed in so many situations sometimes planned sometimes unplanned and and i think that that's what makes music so special um you know the other day we had a a little girl who came to visit us uh where i'm based uh in in cambridgeer and uh her have music teacher had written to us and and said that this little girl is getting bullied at school at the moment and she's the only one that's wearing hearing aids and so you know she's she's um getting a little bit of a hard time and so she just felt that well maybe just having a little five minute exchange or something together might make a difference so she came through the door literally cowering behind her her mother not saying anything and by the time she left the building she was leading the adults now she left saying okay i may not hear as well but i'm a very good listener and what we just worked on was listening to the resonance of sound so striking something so someone might say something not nice to you but then if you just slow that body down and listen to the resonance it gives you time to think about an action so rather than being reactive and saying how dare you say that to me is let that go let that go and then you can make your decision thereafter and it made all the difference to her i mean this is why we we listen to the acoustics and the acoustics really is our instrument you know not the the the cello or the violin or the the marimba or whatever it is what the room and how the room carries that instrument and in a way that's what listening is all about it's just giving the space to listen to the acoustics of if listening and so she just literally left you know where she knew that she could listen even if our hearing is something that could be measured but the listening was something that she could really control and that just changed her whole way of moving forward and dealing with situations um and so that wasn't about you know playing percussion or finding you know oh let's play this rhythm together and and that kind of thing it was just literally dealing with sounds with interaction listening with each other etc etc um and so what do you call that do you call that music do you call it sound do you what do you call it you know so um so yes it is incredibly important how we can manipulate um in the nicest possible way sound music to the situations that were were were in good to the gentleman very back row there hello there how we doing i have been enjoying the plethora of well-spoken scottish accents here pronouncing teas and words like water i think you might be able to shine a bit of light on something that could be really beneficial not just to myself but to others which is um your comment there about um looking for the next Lang Lang and that guy that got put on that television show the piano where i got trained by Lang Lang how wonderful but something came up for me that became really really clear which is socioeconomic background and your life circumstance a la with family and so on and so forth seems to really really determine how accessible the creative industries and music is for an individual i have a lot of friends who have came through a very similar situation as me as of to despite being creatives and musicians we were never able to co-operate with the academic music world and this is for a lot of reasons from the language to the lack of just how education is delivered to people who are in a situation where it is not of the culture that they are brought up in to cooperate within those confines so for somebody like me i find it very difficult to understand where i should go next i have all my work i can do all my shows however my understanding of the music world has not been academic it has not been operas at the usher hall and so on and so forth it has been night clubs it has been raves it has been music festivals it has been long nights at five in the morning seeing human society at its best and at its worst and this is wholly removed from what i've been observing of the academic music world and therefore i find it very difficult to meet people or to understand where to network from someone who's coming from outside of that circumference because i'm in my little flat that's far far outside of Edinburgh or anywhere in my what is called a deprived area apparently which is suits well for me playing my piano and making all of my songs you know my music all day but getting into the town knowing where i should go or feeling comfortable to go oh in fact why don't i just go speak to them university why don't i go see these people oh they wouldn't want to speak to me i'm a grotty chap to these people they might not even understand my accent and if quite quickly would alienate myself from it and don't feel comfortable to know where to go or where to start so i'm wondering for someone who has travelled around what is your advice to people like me well thank you very much for for that question and it's interesting that you pick up up on the fact that perhaps where we've been emphasising on the academic journey of music and and i think it is important to to know as we've said really all morning that music does belong to us all the very fact that you've you've got a piano in your your flat and the fact that you are able to go to all of these different musical experiences raves or whatever it might be is really really crucial and the fact that you are here is absolutely valuable and and that's that's really important that that we're able to express you know what what your feelings are and you know it is interesting what you're saying because i think that there's possibly and through technology through social media through the means that we can reach out to different people is to express almost what you have just said and that question that you you have asked well how can i connect but you know what one of the things that you do as a young professional musician you know we're not far removed at all in fact we're probably in exactly the same place where we we think oh god you know how do i go up to that person and say oh uh hello um i'm Evelyn and this is what i do and uh you know we think they're not going to listen and uh and so we all have that kind of um insecurity in a way that that's that's perfectly natural um but like everything else it needs to be practiced you know we've just got to make that step to go up you know go backstage and say oh hello and if somebody ignores you they ignore you and and that's that but the point is that you have done your bit by going up and and i think that once we get used to that feeling if approaching people you know and and just just saying to them what you know what you've have just said very passionately that means an awful lot you know it really does and i will remember what you said when i walk out of out of this building and i'll think about what you've said so even if you feel is though something hasn't actually uh come back to you at that particular point you never know how that person that you have met is actually going away and feeling so don't always think that you know there's just this blank face uh that is is come your way so um i think that it that happens to us all and it happens to many people you know in all different kinds of professions um so you know that you can step in to a situation and say your your peace you know save what you're feeling and that's that is incredibly powerful that is something that you should feel really you know proud of very positive of and we're all listening you know we really are um but it is something that even you know as a seasoned professional i don't always feel comfortable going up to somebody and saying you know uh hi and and oh by the way you know you might want to listen to this or oh this is what i've been doing lately might interest you i find that very difficult to do myself um i prefer other people doing it but sometimes i have to do it and that's that's just part and partial if if if what needs to be done you know so whatever you do don't become the victim here you know don't get used to poor old me you know keep keep going with these steps um that you've done so today what you said is really important really powerful and and keep making sure your voice is heard thank you very much indeed i'm afraid we have i think now gone beyond the time i was supposed to start winding up so can i thank you all very much indeed for your participation in this in conversation can i thank also um our partners the Edinburgh international festival and in particular our bsl interpreters for today's event shona dixon and heather graham thank you very much indeed um can i take the opportunity to remind everyone that the festival continues until friday including a discussion on how to disagree agreeably at 1 45 p.m. today i refer back to my point about earlier plugs being acceptable i'm cheering that event but there's also an in conversation with the broadcaster and politician michael pertillo tomorrow tomorrow followed by a discussion on the future of scotland's arts and culture amongst other events and finally closing the festival of politics partnership with the Edinburgh international festival series of talks on where we go from here there'll be an in conversation with one of the world's foremost music conductors of today gustavo dudamel on friday the 25th of august but can i conclude by offering a particular thanks to dame evelyn glennie for being so generous with our time so thoughtful in her responses i will certainly be listening to my inner babble more often as we go forward but can i ask you in the usual way to show your appreciation for dame evelyn glennie