Kate Daisy Grant's Blog

[theexistenceroom-blog]

THREE REASONS TO LIVE (Pro refugee march, Brighton January 2017)

1) ‘The people you surround yourself with….and Oreos’ Georgia Croucher, law student

2) ‘Doing what I love doing - I’m passionate about the environment.’ Ralph Palmer, environmental law masters student

3) ‘Good treatment of people. Having a better attitude to refugees and what they’re all about as they’re usually really misunderstood. All the people here (on the march) show a different side to what the media represents’ Hermela Girmay, social work student

[theexistenceroom-blog]

Reason to Live #10 by Lizz Fitt

‘To wake up in the morning on top of the world, to cook and share breakfast and love, with someone who shares back - free of the weight of anything but now.’

[purplebuddhaproject]

https://www.instagram.com/pbuddhaproject/

[theexistenceroom-blog]

REASON TO LIVE #8 ‘CHRYSALIS’ BY LOUISA TOMLINSON (with photography by Emily Nia Watson)

‘I’m a poet and therapist based in Brighton, and live for adventures through starlit nights’. 

www.atthestillpoint.co 

[theexistenceroom-blog]

REASON TO LIVE #6 - JOHN FROM ‘RUMOURS’

‘“If I can make somebody smile, I’ve done my work.” I got that from my grandmother, who was a spiritualist. I’m a working medium and got the gift from her. 

My grandmother was a Catholic who was thrown out of the Church because her grandson is gay. I still believe in God, or the highest spirit as it’s known in spiritualism - it’s based on love. 

I still think there’s a lot of beauty in the Catholic religion, especially the parts based on Jesus’s teachings. It’s all about ‘if you can walk past someone who’s looking miserable and you can lift their hearts with a ‘good morning’ or a smile, they feel that somebody cares.’’

[theexistenceroom-blog]

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REASON TO LIVE #5 ‘Martin Collins’ by Chris Holland and the Orpheus Centre

Chris wrote the song about Martin Collins (his befriender at Orpheus) because in Christopher’s words “he is a fantastic friend and I have a great working relationship with him”.   Chris describes himself as an entertainer who loves performing in front of millions of people. He has just returned from a hectic two week tour of the karaoke bars on Independence of the Seas. He says he is now fully focused on deciding who should win the current X Factor competition.

Chris is an alumni of The Orpheus Centre, Surrey, UK - a centre which specialises in teaching independence skills through the arts to young adults with disabilities.

Full lyrics:

His heart is unbeatable - he cycles to work

He goes on holiday quite a lot

Whatever he wants to do and the amusement park

(and he cycles in Belgium)

Out and about

Like a bulldog

When he’s happy he’s red as ketchup

I wonder what size ketchup they have in Tenerife (or Belgium)

I don’t know what his plans are but I want him back next year

They may have crabs in Tenerife, lobsters in France

But Martin just cooks for himself

He likes me a lot, no matter where his next holiday ends up

He’s a befriender who skydives, he writes down notes

He’s a great musician

We started piano lessons on the first of March, 2012

I don’t know what his plans are, but I want him back next year (next week)

He works with me in a polite and friendly manner

And he never gets on my nerves

He’s a softie, and a leftie

If he was American he’d vote for Obama

When I first met him, he grew a beard

I told him to shave immediately

When I see him this Thursday leading up to evaluation

That will be the 26th of June

That is when I’ll ask him to shave

I like being the boss of the centre

One way or another, the job is mine

I don’t know what his plans are but I want him back next year

Martin Collins, Martin Collins, Martin Collins (to infinity)

[hipster-indie-retro]

[katedaisygrant]

My new single 'Little Bird' - to be released on 8/9/14 on Oscar Records with my new album 'Portrait'. Puppets and artwork by Daisy Jordan Filming and editing by Anna Schmidt

[katedaisygrant]

With Oscar 'The Pants' Grant. A picture I found of our journey back from Edinburgh (via Wales where Oscar was staying with my friends Mali and Steve and their baby and sheepdog). I look tired. Oscar just looks happy to be looking out of a window. That's the kind of bloke he is.

[rosskempfolds]

‘Something smells a bit Kemp‏’

by Graham Andrews

[katedaisygrant]

Nick fixes my bike with a dulcimer string!  And us doing our show at Fingers Piano Bar...

Writing on Sunday - where most shows (including all the Free Fringe shows) have done their last performance, the cartoonish fantasy Edinburgh begins to melt and peel off the walls along with the posters. Nick warned me (as he is now on his 14th Fringe) that there is nothing as exciting as the first week - everyone is full of hopes and dreams of being discovered and is full of energy to fuel their tireless self-promotion - and nothing as bleak as the final few days. It is a bit like the aftermath of every child's birthday party and Christmas combined. You feel a little bit sick and like you've been playing enforced party games for a few days too many.

It has been a brilliant and unforgettable experience, despite losing my voice to flu and having to cancel our last 3 shows. I've met very talented and very nice people (usually in the same package!) and have been blown away by the camaraderie of performers supporting each other through the highs and lows. I've sung country music for the first time with Rich Hall's hoedown band (and doing that felt my first real stage fright) and made lovely new friends.

Doing the fringe feels like being in a new world of incredible opportunities (in good and difficult ways - sometimes you're getting the opportunities, sometimes you watch them getting given to others and you just have to keep smiling). Fortunes change from one minute to the next and if you're lucky enough to get a good review, your audience sizes multiply instantly.

I can't think of an experience like it, where dancers, actors, comedians, musicians and storytellers are all swimming around the same city. At times it has felt like a festival, a travelling circus and a get-together of a huge family of misfits, who suddenly don't feel quite so weird.

Going back to Brighton, back to the sea air and away from the constant waft of the brewery will be great, but I will miss waking up to the unknown adventure of every day here, where you don't want to sleep in case you miss any amazing event. I'm sure being back with my dog will set me to rights though.

[katedaisygrant]

1) Knitted Frog plots military coup of Edinburgh Castle. Fails.

2) Have had to leave Oscar with my lovely friends Mali and Steve in Wales - am relying on intermittent holiday snaps as only link to camp furry son. Am dedicating songs to him as psychic link-up attempt. Maybe this should be part of the act.

[katedaisygrant]

Day 2 Edinburgh Fringe blog

Hi everyone,

So, apparently Edinburgh was enjoying really good weather right up til the second we opened the car to take out electrical equipment. It's wet, it's humid, it's grey but you can really feel the excitement building in the air. I am excited but also nervous - there's no way of telling how any of it's going to go until it starts - but that's the joy of the Edinburgh Fringe!

Going to see my venue 'Fingers Piano Bar' tomorrow and in the meantime, am practising frenetically, particularly a couple of new songs. One's called 'Doubt' - about the weird way the whole world seems to up-end itself and the smallest, easiest thing becomes gluey as soon as the dreaded 'D' comes in.

Want to also track down a Newton's Cradle - the office toy with the clanging metal balls - for my song 'Balls of Steel', get some way of supporting a set of toy bells on a stand, and also a singing bird in a cage. Hey, we all got our shopping lists!

Hope you enjoy my song 'Things we like to Press' on the link.

See you in a couple of days...

[katedaisygrant]

The latest  of  my first album batch of cobbled-together home-made music vids, featuring chins, lady footballers and a plethora of Telescopic Babies.

I've been practising like a loon with Nick Pynn for our show in Edinburgh for the fringe festival this year. If you find yourself in the neck, we'll be at Fingers Piano Bar at 6.40pm, from 6th - 27th August (not Mondays). For only two people, we will be heavily outnumbered by our instruments, which will include violin, viola, piano, toy piano, bells, autoharp, bass pedals, dulcimer and MORE! Come hear us, or alternatively just dig us out from under the pile-up of twanging objects.

I'll be doing a blog while at Edinburgh, of video diaries, photos and just general sights and smells of the festival - very exciting!

On an unrelated note, if you can see 'LINT - THE MOVIE' - it will be one of the funniest things you will ever see - a documentary about a fictional writer/ musician/ cartoonist whose sole intent was to make no sense at all. I have had problems restraining mirthful outbursts since I saw it a few weeks ago. And while you're at it, buy 'THE CATERER' comic - it's too good.

[katedaisygrant]

Working with Nick Pynn and Ken Rose in the studio today - Nick has played drowning flies, fairies and dogs cutting umbilical cords on his violin, and now Ken is going wild on the Korg Monotron - which however wrong, it's always so right.

[katedaisygrant]

Here's my new video - I got through about 5 cameras in my haphazard stop motion style...Now onto making the next 7 videos for my first album!

[katedaisygrant]

Taken by James Torr at an abandoned farmhouse, somewhere in East Sussex...