What happened at the event?

What did people think about it?

Photos and videos

The original event web page for the CMVic Treetops Music Camp 2015 can be found here.

What happened at the event?

The CMVic Treetops Music Camp 2015 was a vibrant weekend of music making, singing, and dancing, with sessions and workshops for all tastes and abilities - it was a chance to learn, participate, exchange, and celebrate. Here're some of the highlights:

• We had Street Horns  & percussion workshops with Travis Woods and Daniel Berry from The Horns of Leroy
• A Peace Songs workshop with Barb "
• The inaugural trial of our "' brilliant 'buddies for beginners' program where anyone could learn an instrument from scratch!
• Khayal SInging workshops with Parvyn Kaur Singh from The Bombay Royale
• Folk Strings workshops with Brain 'Strat' Strating from BOTSO and Josh Bennett, also from The Bombay Royale
• Uke Jams around the fire in the sunshine
• Kids bands and singing workshops with Dani Roca, Adam Burke and Katie Hull-Brown
• Song Swaps, forums and leadership skills sessions
• Accordion workshops with Phil Carroll
• Marimba buidling ALL WEEKEND! with Andy Rigby and Dave Paxton
• An all in ensemble where you could sing and play to your hearts content, with Aaron Silver and Matt Sheers
• A share the music session with members of The Welcome Group 
• A party to end all parties on Saturday night with The Scrimshaw Four (& friends)
• Plenty of opportunities for sponataneous connections and mentoring to occur
• A big bold, colourful street band style procession to wrap things up on Sunday

Open to everyone whether a CMVic Member or not, this unique and fun event brought together in one place choirs and street bands, young and old, beginners and old hands.  As well as lots of opportunities for singing and playing music, there were leadership skills sessions for both singers and instrumentalists too.  Great workshop leaders from all over Victoria ran a wonderful variety of sessions, and the camp provided lots of space for enjoying all the free time people wanted.

A total of 122 people came to the event, including a significant number of under 25's.

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What did people think about it? Some responses from our evaluation questionnaire

We asked what the best thing about the weekend had been, and here are a few of the responses people gave: 

• "The spirit of inclusion and particpation which was present in all our activities. A big highlight was Parvyn's workshop; awesome and well run."
• "This is the only space that I can be myself freely."
• "This has been a wonderful opportunity for music making, networking, meeting other community singing leaders..."
• "It's like seeing a family but one you want to see..."
• "Cross fertilisation of musical abilities, taste and style."
• "Dancing! I really enjoyed dancing with everyone."
• "Lots of fun, sharing, community, great food, atmosphere, focus."
• "Too many best things. The buddies."

We received some great feedback from the workshop leaders, too, showing the structure of these events is mutually rewarding: 

• "Thanks back to you too for the opportunity to contribute to such a great event. A compulsive jammer such as myself was like a pig in mud (and for some of it, like a musician in mud too). "
• "Thanks for organising a fantastic weekend, I feel full to the brim"
•  "It's really great to see so many enthusiastic people and pass on the knowledge and skills we've gained over the years."
• "It was such a fun filled weekend and we felt so welcome and included which I think everyone at the camp did. I really like the way the younger generation seem to be getting involved and enthusiastic about it all."
• "It was so lovely to be among musical friends and have all those incidental conversations, info exchanges and inspirational things happening all around!"

We asked people what we could have done to improve the weekend:

• "If it could be planned on a warmer weekend"
• "For each workshop nominate a leader for each section-e.g. violin, ukulele, cello- so that the leader of the sections can help the beginners, esp the kids."
• "Maybe you could combine some art projects such as making a mural or drawing lessons."

We also asked people if they'd learned something new or done something different over the weekend:

• "Learned some lovely short songs and had a great chat about starting up a new group."
• "led a song for a large group."
• "everything including brass band and Indian classical singing is new- wonderful to watch it all unfold."
• "I played uke for the first time. It was great fun and I intend to buy one."
•  "I have been taught that playing instruments with heaps of people is really fun"

Finally, we asked people to describe Treetops in 3 words. We had a heap of different ones, but these were the most used. Numbers indicate repeats:

• Fun  (11)
• Inclusive (6)
• Friendly  (5)
• Musical (4)
• Awesome (2)
• Connection (2)
• Excellent (2)
• Interesting (2)
• Stimulating (2)
• Welcoming (2)

Photos and Videos

Click here for photos videos

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