10 Things I'd Like My Readers to Know: Kittie Lambton
1 - I am hugely inspired by the women I have had the pleasure to know in my life! My cello lessons from my lovely cello teacher held once per week left a lasting impression on me as a young child. Such wonderful mentoring has inspired me to try to give back to the community as best I can. If everyone spent a little time working with others, running a local music group, working with children to learn instruments, helping out at an arts festival, then the world would be a much better place! Happily I have been very privileged to know kindness and have been welcomed to participate in local community arts projects – always a most rewarding experience. If everyone got involved, even in the seemingly smallest of ways, empathy and understanding for one another, and a love of the arts would infectiously spread!
2 - I have a secret desire to buy ten cellos of varying sizes and to teach students for free no matter their age or ability. My dream would be to showcase our work within the local community! When I was at primary school, I was lucky enough to have had a school audition that was being held for children from the age of seven or eight years old to see who wanted to play an instrument. I was then provided with a cello loaned by the school to be able to learn! Without this incentive and the magical instrument loaned to me, I might never have had the opportunity to learn the cello!
3 - Music learning takes form from a young age when your imagination is running riot throughout your day and night dreaming worlds! It’s also a good time to get through the ‘squeaky’ stages which you tend not to notice as a youngster! There are so many benefits that hold you in good stead for life such as persevering through a piece or song that is at first difficult to play, but with a little effort you are able to play the music all the way through! Discipline to refine your skills, which helps to build stamina for any project that you turn your eye to throughout life, is acquired through learning music!
4 - Interestingly, surgeons who have trained as musicians and who require dexterity and coordination of both hands, benefit greatly from having learned instruments!
5 - Cats are beautiful creatures and feature greatly in my writing. Whether timid house cats with long and fluffy fur who sleep under the bed purring loudly or hardy cats who roam all winter long and languish around the place come the summer months, are a calming delight for us all!
6 - As we know, brain research is still in the early stages of development. Neuroscience and the research of how music improves memory, or affects our mood is really only just beginning to be understood! Music extends far beyond having a playlist of our favourite songs and assists our inner wellbeing and health. I like to explore how music evokes memory in my books!
7 - I do hope that full arts funding will be restored back to schools so that all students can develop their ensemble and collaboration skills from a young age. Would it not be great to hear jazz and music ensembles filling the streets and corridors across all nations and see instruments being passed down through many a generation with a love to learn how to make them sing!
8 - I love history and I am fascinated by World War Two. To think that our grandparents had little choice but to sign up to be part of the war effort, with the knowledge that World War One had taken place only a few years before! The importance of why European laws and legislation was initially drawn should not be forgotten. The NHS came about to ensure all citizens could access free medical care following such devastating times of war.
9 - I am a cellist and feel very happy when I teach cello to youngsters. All that I have learned and even the way I express how to play is directly connected from what I was taught as a child. I especially like to play at functions with small groups of other musicians and do try not to get the giggles which I often do when a funny moment happens and eye contact between the musicians just makes you laugh!
10 - I love our shared heritage and particularly our built heritage. Buildings and houses feature very much in my writing! Beautifully designed spaces and places, their acoustics and specific smells that in turn connect music and memory is so important to our everyday lives.