After the Summer, I started 
volunteering at one of the playgroups, putting out toys, boiling kettles, chopping fruit, that sort of thing. It was a good way of getting me to interact with adults! One morning we were packing away at the end of the playgroup. My friend Liam and myself were stacking chairs when one of the playgroups organisers came up to us, “I don’t suppose either of you boys play the guitar at all?”, we both nodded enthusiastically, “I bet neither of you sing though..” just as she was about to turn away, Liam declares “Yeah, Phil does!”
The following week I was leading the singalong that we have after tidy up time. I had figured out and rehearsed a handful of the usual songs but I had still never sung solo in public before. Especially not in the middle of a huge brightly lit hall with everyone looking at me expectantly. I was terrified. It was awful. I was awful. I forgot to say which animals Old McDonald kept on his farm. I was leaving gaps in between lines of songs that no one was used to, and when I had finished everything I had prepared, everyone just looked at me, “What about the Hokey Cokey!?” they all said..
Apparently you can’t leave the Playgroup without doing the Hokey Cokey. It was terribly awkward and I clearly had a lot to learn, but I didn’t want to give up, so I went back the following week and went through it all again!
Things went on in this way for several weeks while I slowly got to grips with the singing, my voice got stronger, I decided to use an amplifier for my guitar and I developed a parachute routine. Each week, I would disappear into a quiet corner to tune my guitar and practice my breathing exercises. The breathing exercises were more for fending off panic attacks than for helping with my voice!
Until one week I had an idea. What if I got everyone into a circle by singing “Here we go round the Mulberry Bush”, and marching around the outside of the room, hoping that everyone would follow me. I had no idea whether it would work or not, so I just went for it. I pushed my voice as hard as I could and strode out confidently. I didn’t dare look back to see if anyone was following me, but about halfway round I could see the circle forming, I couldn’t believe it had actually worked, everyone was following me! After this, my weekly routine developed and improved, my voice got stronger, I became more confident and I could see the playgroup was becoming busier and busier.
Not long afterwards I was ready to begin teaching Rainbow Music for Kids classes. These were hard. So much more in depth than just stomping round a church hall singing my head off. Also, people were paying to attend these classes, it wasn’t just an extra freebie tacked on the end of the playgroup, this had to be good. No pressure! We had enough people signed up to run a couple of classes every Friday which was amazing, but all the time I was convinced that at any moment someone would point out that I had no idea what I was doing and that I actually couldn’t sing at all. Luckily, everyone was far too polite for that and my Rainbow Music Classes were able to continue!
Read Part 1 “A New Beginning..”