Created in Birmingham

Clare Edwards: “I have often wondered if CBSO concerts would be more enjoyed by some of the audience if they had an area where they could dance or at least move along to the music.” God YES! Howabout an experimental concert at the Town Hall without seating?

The Birmingham Post is to get a new website next year. We know this because journalist Joana Geary has put in a request on her blog asking what people want from the new site so she can feed this into the design process. Which, I have to say, is a damn refreshing way to go about this sort of thing. If you’ve got some ideas go give them to her.

Councilor Martin Mullaney interviews graffiti artist Rob Elliott, aka Juice 126, specifically about the Selly Oak graffiti park where he worked in the 80s and 90s.

via Mullaney @ The Stirrer

The Pub Conversations event about studio space provision for artists in Birmingham has proved too popular for the Lamp Tavern and will be relocated to Vivid on Heath Mill Lane (and presumably renamed “Warehouse Conversations”). The date remains the same: Tuesday 4th December at 7.30pm

Some observations:

1. The topic is obviously a hot button issue. Those in positions to affect it take note. You might want to attend this.
2. The organisers appear to have reached outside their usual network for this given the response so expect a wide range of opinions.
3. While it’s a last minute move and Vivid is a good location it seems odd that there’s nothing inbetween a pub room and a warehouse for this sort of meeting to take place in.

Co-organizer Niki Pugh has the details.
Previously on CiB.

Pram are on the front cover of The Wire this month.

Sadly the article isn’t online but they have made an mp3 available, “an unreleased instrumental soundtrack to the short film Electric Séance directed by Scott Johnston of filmficciones and produced as part of the 2006 Photophonic Experiment“.

via Feuilleton

The Stirrer interviews Councilor Ray Hassall about the future of Artsfest, the new bi-annual Dance Festival and an “embryonic” bi-annual music festival to complement it.

Your thoughts?

A film by WebsterGotts as part of the current show at Crowd 6 in, yes, Bearwood. It runs until December 9th. via JRD168

Heeeere’s Brumcast #77.
[audio:http://ipodnetworks.com/podcast/363/2015_hifi.mp3]

Arts and Crafts and Stuff is a Facebook group “from the West Midlands to promote local stuff, explore ideas and discover crafty blogs or etsy sites”. Well worth joining if you’re of that ilk, I reckon. The number of fairs and markets along these lines in the region implies there’s definitely a community out there. Be nice to see them come together somewhere.

It was started by One Whining Wench whose blog I’ll be keeping tabs on.

People, the independent fashion / design shop in Kings Heath, have updated their website with their Autumn / Winter collection.

The photos are by Emily Quinton.

The relevance to the creative industries is tenuous if there at all but this has been amusing me greatly over the last week and I have to share.

What do you get when you combine the phenomena of the lolcat, where humourous captions are applied to photos of cats, with the phenomena of local councilors with blogs?

You get LOLDEIRDRE!

If you have to ask “why?” then you’ll never understand. Move along…

via numerous Birmingham blogs

Digital Central has an interview with “band manager, label owner, promoter and magazine producer” Scott Roe of Solar Creations as part of their series of chats with music industry folks about what’s good and bad and needed in Birmingham. His summary is worth swiping I feel:

Strengths

* The region is extremely diverse in terms of musical output, creative business ideas and management styles.
* Good range of small music venues which have always been a good breeding ground for new talent.
* Spirit, determination and passion for succeeding within the music business.
* Experienced music industry players who have a wealth of experience working throughout the UK and abroad.
* The location should be a huge advantage for us.
* The perception of the region’s music scene has risen dramatically over the last five years or so.

Weaknesses

* Lack of skilled music managers, skilled business types involved with music business or vision to explore markets outside of the UK by many.
* Inappropriate use of funding on a yearly basis; too much discussion and talk about “The industry”
* Lack of medium-sized music venues (that old chestnut!)

Read on…

Rich Batsford talks about Experimental Naratives in relation to the work that goes into structuring Project X Presents.

I submitted two narratives:

“Welcome, Engagement, Focus, Development, Agitation, Challenge, Excitation, Ecstacy” and
“Entry, Acclimatisation, Cohesion, Inspiration, Altercation, Realisation, Transcendence”.

It’ll be interesting to see where it all leads.

Artstalking Ana reports on the current exhibition at Bearwood’s Crowd 6, a joint show between WebsterGotts and Mandy Rees.

Birmingham is lucky to have new artist-led spaces putting on light and engaging show like this, it’s what really puts us on the map, so lets hope they get the support they deserve, whatever their future plans.

The Vaults is a new bar and restaurant in the Jewellery Quarter co-owned by Russell of Clusta, but of interest to us is this sentence:

The Vaults also exhibits art works from contemporary artists and photographers from across the country.

via the Blink blog