Mary Reid

Back in the summer I enjoyed a BBQ with the Tolworth Organic Gardening Club on their allotment. At their AGM yesterday they changed their name to Tolworth Community Gardening Club; not because they've given up on organic principles - far from it - but because they wanted to emphasise the open community nature of what they are doing. This is a club that makes strong efforts to be inclusive, is disability aware and welcomes people of all ages.

I was delighted to see that Kingston's Parks contractor, Quadron, was fully involved in the project. Indeed they are looking for other possible sites and are able to draw on charitable funding to support them. All it needs is a few enthusiastic individuals!

The meeting concluded with some entertainment, which took me completely by surprise. There was no obvious connection with gardening, but we heard overtone singing from Rollin Rachele. The technique is explained here, and that article also refers to Rollin's book. Essentially he produces a normal baritone sound and then he overlays that with a tune that sounds like a piccolo playing. Apparently, what he does is to use his mouth, nasal and sinus passges to amplify the high components of the basic tone - all sounds are complex and include many harmonics, and he somehow isolates them and creates astonishing music.

Rollin on right with drummer Jason