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A Day in the Life of Clarence
Written by Clarence for the Northern Sinfonia Friends Newsletter March-May 2010
My career as sub-principal trumpet with Northern Sinfonia since April 1992 came to an abrupt end in August of 1995 when a road accident resulted in spinal injury and paralysis from the neck down. John Summers, the then Chief Executive, soon reassured me that I could still be offered employment within the organisation. My enthusiasm for music remained undiminished and once discharged from hospital I set up a new wheelchair friendly home in Jesmond, Newcastle.
I accepted the role first as orchestra manager for Northern Sinfonia before commencing my current job two years later as orchestra animateur, (involving members of the orchestra in workshops) in the Learning and Participation department of The Sage Gateshead.
I wake very early in the morning. Having the facility in my bedroom, I start listening to music, normally for pleasure but sometimes as preparation for a current project. This helps me to memorise scores, or to extract themes and motifs for a workshop. I do this until the rest of my world starts to come alive.
The routines of getting up and ready for the day can take a considerable time with my level of disability, which includes physiotherapy every day to maintain my unused joints and keep my muscles in a supple condition.
By 10.30am I start work using electronically adapted equipment at home I can independently check messages, reply to e-mails, make phone calls and write letters.
After an early brunch I’m driven in my adapted van to work at The Sage Gateshead. During the summer I sometimes enjoy making this journey in my electrically-powered wheelchair (though sometimes my carers have a job keeping up!) through the Toon and over one of the bridges.
My work based at The Sage Gateshead is quite varied: from meetings with my colleagues and managers to coaching an adult class of amateur musicians on ensemble techniques, leading a workshop with visiting school groups, which recently involved two classes of 6-7 year olds, teaching them and sometimes their teachers the names and how to hold and play the different percussion instruments whilst doing warm-ups and composing soundscapes related to their visit. All of this sometimes has to happen within a 55 minute session. I enjoy the intensive challenge, as I seek to impart my enthusiasm for music upon the group.
Later on in the day I might try to catch a bit of a Northern Sinfonia rehearsal, which I still find greatly inspiring: keeping in touch with the players, which is necessary for future projects and workshops, listening to conductors, and a personal challenge – to mentally participate and help push my own personal musical standards.
My desk is on the lower level of The Sage Gateshead, in the Music Education Centre. I often refer to it as the engine room in the ship (not necessarily the slaves doing the rowing though!) and I spend the rest of my working day on writing up or planning future projects, tracking down music and sometimes arranging and transposing music for my future classes.
Some days can include directing a “Cobweb” orchestra rehearsal or coaching a university brass group. An alternative to a day in music could find me involved in disabled committees around the town and in the hospitals.
It is rewarding to hear from some of the visitors to The Sage Gateshead that I meet. I’ll leave you with a brief note from a student that visited a rehearsal in February: “Hello Clarence, I was a member of the group of A-Level students from Egglescliffe Sixth Form who attended the Northern Sinfonia rehearsal at The Sage Gateshead on the 5 February, and who had the privilege of testing out the headsets through which we could hear your commentary. I would again like to thank you for the said event, and say that your advice and help were really useful. I’m sure you’ve heard it before, that you are an inspiration to musicians and I’m extremely glad I attended the event, and was very humbled to meet you and hear you talk. Many thanks”.