'Out Of The Door Of The Ark' is the title of this 2008 collection of original songs and stories by Nico Brown, accompanied by Martin Brunsden and Kate Powell.
Recorded by Martin Brunsden and mixed by Karl Odlum.
JOIN IN WITH THE SONGS
1 Jungle Journey
You can help make all the sounds of this trip through wild Africa. Slap your knees for footsteps. Rub your hands for a grassy rustle. Flobber your lips and pop your cheeks for the river and thump your chest for the sound and rhythm of your feet crossing the bridge. When we jump over the creatures you can count the beat and try and land at the same time as us.
2 Aye Aye Captain
There are actions for all the five Pirate Rules. They are not compulsory, unlike pirates, who are very compulsory.
On 'aye aye captain' you cover your eye like a pirate and salute like a swab.
On the cutlass you slash and stab.
On the plank you edge forward three times, then slither to your doom.
On the laugh you make up your own hideous pirate guffaw.
For the treasure you turn the key in the lock, lift up the lid and gasp greedily.
3. Turtles 1
Make the wave sounds with us and rustle your hands to make the sound of midnight palm trees. Help the turtle dig and fill in her hole. I'm sorry she doesn't escape from the net too. But that's the way it is and there is a second part to the story...
4. In That Door
The daddy animals are louder than the mammy ones, and the babies are quieter. That isn't always true, but it is for this song.
5. The Last Puppy
Please join in with singing this. Nowadays you don't see puppies in petshop windows because everyone knows it's unkind. Anyway a puppy isn't just for Christmas, is it? We forgot to write on the CD that Martin plays the trombone on this song. He'd never played it much before. That's Kate's dog Hatty you can hear whimpering because we've shut her out. We had to, because she howls whenever she hears the accordion.
6. Turtles 2
If the sand is warm all the baby turtles will be girls. Boy turtles hatch from colder sand. They come from many different turtle fathers. You can be inside the eggs, hatch out and help with the sound of the sea. When we perform this we pass furry toy turtles around the circle and chase them with a furry shark.
7. Mon Ami
My friend Matthew told me this story when I was about 6. I hope French people don't mind this song about OUI. If you don't mind, you can join in OUIing (and NONing) too.
8. This Is Our Cafe
Help us chop, mix, fry and eat. We sang this song in 'The Christmas Cafe,' a show at The Ark. Nico played an 8-year-old girl called Nicola, wore pigtails and did ballet with Cindy Cummings. Martin wore a nappy as Malachy, a huge baby with dreadlocks. It was great!
THE INSTRUMENTS
Recording is clever and you can add as many extra tracks of instruments playing on top of the song as you like.
Martin plays: Bertha, his double bass. He has devilishly cunning and delicate recording things implanted all over her.
His singing saw. He bends it in a special way and tickles it with a violin bow. The Trombone. Swannee Whistle. You blow this cross between a recorder and a trombone, and push a sliding thing up to go high, and down to go low.
Kate plays: Her violin. On 'The Last Puppy' at least five Kates play, and she makes the bird-sounds in 'Turtles 2'. Swannee whistle. She happened to have another one.
Nico plays: His Hohner Student accordion, which he holds upside down because he is left-handed. It has 48 bass buttons and a piano keyboard. It's heavy and sometimes gives him a backache.
A Ghanaian 4-note bass thumbpiano, a box with bamboo tongues you flick. (In That Door).
A Monday Lunch 9-note thumbpiano, with metal tongues (Jungle Journey).
His Martin 018 1964 guitar.
His Gary Silbert 1983 mandolin
His Dick Preston 2002 22-note nylon-stringed harp. (Every school, hospital and home should have one)... and yet another Swannee Whistle.
We all sing, shout, gurgle and make funny faces with our noises. |
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