Age: 12 to 17 years old.
Warning! Sensitive ears may wish to stay clear!!!
For summer 2012: Only 1 location - the Schulich School of Music of McGill University (downtown campus)
At Garage Band Camp, guitarists, bassists, keyboard players, singers and drummers 12 years and older learn about all aspects of making music in a band. The goal isn't to learn to play an instrument (campers should already know how to play their instruments), but to get together in bands to learn and jam with each other with the sound cranked to the max!
Over the course of each two-week session, Garage Band Campers will touch on every aspect of life in a band. The "Style of the Day" activity covers a different musical style each day through a multimedia presentation including photos and video/audio clips. Campers are thus exposed to a huge variety of styles of music such as blues, classic rock, punk rock, soul, funk, world music, heavy metal and more! However, even if the "Style of the Day" is heavy metal, it doesn't mean that all the bands necessarily have to learn a heavy metal song!
Each day, a different aspect of band life is also discussed, for example: communication between band members - both on and off stage, compromise as a necessary tool for group work, how to find places to practice and perform, how to get your first gig, how to put together a show, the ethics of performing - what to do and what not to do, how to promote your band, life on tour, how to assemble a press kit, how to interact with the media, the role of an agent or manager, and more!
Campers also come up with their band name and logo, which they will include on the posters that they will create - and put up! - for the show.
At least three hours are dedicated to supervised practice each day. Each band gets its own rehearsal space and the specialized counsellors rotate between them to help, direct and offer a ton of suggestions. Band members are given help deciding which songs they are going to learn. Every few days, some of the bands play what they've been working on for all the other bands to hear.
What's more, depending on scheduling and availability, Garage Band Camp campers may get the chance to learn Apple's “GarageBand” software, to make a video clip in collaboration with the Video Camp campers, to have a photo session, to make a recording in a professional studio at McGill University's Schulich School of Music, to discover the possibilities and accessibility of an amateur studio, to meet professional artists, to watch DVDs of concerts given by great musicians and discuss what they observe with their teachers.
At the end of two intense weeks, the whole session culminates in a show performed in a professional hall, for parents and friends who are floored to see their precious little darlings on stage, singing, dancing, playing their instruments and expressing loud and clear what they feel in their guts.
The young participants in Garage Band Camp finish their sessions saturated with music, having had an out-of-this-world experience, and leave with a better idea of how bands work and a few tricks on how to get their first break.
Garage Band Camp offers you two choices:
•register yourself; we will place you in a band (first registered, first served!! Be ready to compromise - not all of your new bandmates will have identical musical tastes … catch my drift?!?)
•register your band (the majority of the group's members must participate, and each member must complete a registration form, indicating the names and instruments of their bandmates).