By Andrew Turner

Continuing my pursuit into the musical goings on in and around Epsom, I headed to ‘Realistic Rock!’ Academy on East Street to sit in on a session with some 11-14 year olds taking part in the Live Performance workshop. This particular class consisted of 5 guitarists, 1 bassist and 5 drummers, instructed by Robin (the director of ‘Realistic Rock!’) Richard and Toy, who each specialise in different instruments. The course is 10 weeks long and the class spend about 2 or 3 weeks practising each song, all building up to the Christmas Showcase coming up soon.

In this session, the group recapped a song from last week’s rehearsal, early rock classic ‘You Really Got Me’ by the Kinks. The various musicians took it in turns to play the song, and then they were introduced to this week’s song, ‘Black Horse and the Cherry Tree’ by KT Tunstall.

After a rather interesting game of ‘place the smelly sock on the instructors or your fellow bandmates when they’re performing’, they finally got down to business. The musicians go away for half an hour with each instructor teaching them their separate parts, then they come together and attempt the song. Naturally, I sat in with the bass player, to be among my own kind. I found that the teachers really know how to suit each of the players’ abilities and styles, experimenting and assisting them until they get the hang of the song.

Harry, one of the class’ drummers, said ‘This course is really benefitting our skills and I think I’m doing very well here.

‘We are all really nervous about the showcase, but we’re very excited to perform.’

The instructors at ‘Realistic Rock!’ should really be proud of their efforts, and the children there can be equally proud of their talents. I sat watching the session and I was thoroughly impressed with the amount of hard work they put into their performances. They are very mature and their ability is beyond most musicians I’ve seen at that age. The reputation of ‘Realistic Rock!’ definitely deserves to excel, and the children certainly have my respect – especially if they carry on playing that sock related game...

The ‘Realistic Rock!’ Christmas Showcase is on Monday 21st December at the Epsom Playhouse.