flutterandflyHave you ever had your hand tickled by a clarinet?

No? Then you probably weren’t a member of the Lincoln Drill Hall’s audience for either of Sinfonia Viva’s performances of Flutter and Fly at the weekend.

A sensory delight all round, the show was designed for ages 6 and below and the mini ones knew they’d come to the right place when they were greeted with their choice of sticker and some ribbons to hold ready to wave as kite tails later on (and, of course, anytime they felt like it in between).

FaithRedCushion

The colour of Faith’s beanbag of choice coordinated with her ladybird outfit.

Two steps further in and the very aesthetic carpet of brightly coloured bean bags caught your eye and welcomed you to take a seat on the surrogate clouds ready to float along with the narrative (in between getting up and dancing of course).

Before being lifted up by the music there was a chance to meet the musicians and their instruments and even have a bang on the jungle drum yourself, as well as decorate your own paper aeroplane.

Beyond children’s percussion instruments there are rare opportunities for mini ones to come up close to a range of woodwind, brass and string instruments to see what might capture their interest and this pre-event meet and greet was one of my main reasons to book tickets for the show.

It was then time to take flight with the story of Rowan and her paper aeroplane as we watched illustrations being drawn live alongside listening to the music.

The programme choice definitely appealed to me – from the nostalgic reminder of a bumble bee song we sang at Brownies (although ours wasn’t so nice a version) juxtaposed with The Flight of the Bumblebee to the crowd pleasing Let’s Go Fly a Kite and from a mini ones’ favourite Zoom Zoom Zoom We’re Going to the Moon to Beatles song Blackbird that I haven’t stopped singing since, our ears had a very special treat.

And, as it was the first cultural experience that Faith was mostly awake for rather than sleeping through, it got the miniest of mini ones approval too.

A book and CD of the performance, included in the ticket price, were handed out to families as then left the venue so we could continue our enjoyment at home.

Like the sound of this?  Then you might be interested in the family lunchtime concert being  presented at the Lincoln Drill Hall by the LICMF featuring the Slidin’ About Trombone Quartet.  Click here for more information on the Tuesday, April 4th event that will take place at 1pm.