Patti Smith at the Nobel Prize Ceremony

Patti Smith, with some wonderful musicians, played a beautiful rendition of Dylan's A Hard Rain's A- Gonna Fall at the Nobel Prize Award ceremony. It's one of my favourite songs and I think the perfect choice for the occasion.

See Bob Dylan's acceptance speech here.

- Patrick

Abigail Watson and Bela Fleck: Banjo Love Mosaic

To celebrate a recent album and tour, banjo geniuses Abigail Watson and Bela Fleck asked fans to send in photos of themselves holding a banjo. The result is the Banjo Love mosaic poster made up of all those submitted images:

See the high-res version and galleries of all the individual images on their site, here:

http://www.banjolove.com/#main

As a long-time Bela fan I could't resist, even though I play guitar, I went to my local music store and played around with a beautiful banjo for a while and took this photo for my submission:

This would make a great Visual Arts project for the classroom or the school community. It is a versatile project that can accommodate any theme and include a variety of amounts of participants. Basic photography and photo-editing skills are required. I would recommend using Illustrator and Photoshop to finalize the collaborative poster. 

- Patrick

Studio Project: An Illustrated Verse

Step 1: Choose a favourite song, and pick one verse to illustrate

Step 2: Brainstorming: use various brainstorming techniques to create a list of relevant imagery to use in the illustration. It is important to consider a colour palette at this stage as well as dimensions and media.

Step 3: Research: do some background research about the song, the band, and allusions/imagery referenced to in the verse. Compile visual reference material for all the imagery chosen in Step 2.

Step 4: Thumbnail Sketches (visual brainstorming)

Step 5: Experimentation: media exploration/ Rough Sketch

Step 6: Final Sketch/ Final Work

Step 7: Presentation, Group Critique and Reflection.

Here's an example, using a piece that I made a few years ago, based on the Grateful Dead song Jack Straw (words by Robert Hunter, music by Bob Weir and Jerry Garcia).

The verse that I chose to illustrate:

Leaving Texas,

Fourth day of July


Sun so hot, clouds so low


The eagles filled the sky

Catch the Detroit Lightning

Out of Santa Fe


The Great Northern out of Cheyenne


From sea to shining sea

The Final Sketch:

The Final Work:

The final sketch was done with pigment liners on hot press paper. The sketch was then scanned and coloured in Photoshop. 

See more examples of this project in an ongoing series of illustrated Grateful Dead songs here: patbutlerillustration.com.

What I like about this project in the classroom is that it offers a way for any student to get involved, inspired and excited about creating a visual representation of their favourite song. 

- Patrick

David Bryne: How Architecture Helped Music Evolve

"David Bryne: How Architecture Helped Music Evolve"

Class activity: I would like to use this video as a way in to a unit on architecture. Students could choose any work of architecture and discover how it's design helped shape (or was shaped by) a cultural phenomenon.