Acclaimed percussionist Evelyn Glennie on how she has been banging the drum in lockdown... all 2,500 of them

Evelyn Glennie surrounded by her vast collection of musical instruments

She has banged the drum to worldwide acclaim for more than three decades but percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie has spent lockdown banging many, many more.

Across a dazzling 35-year career when she became the world’s first full-time solo percussionist, Evelyn has amassed a remarkable collection of 2,500 instruments and, over the last 10 months, has been mastering and cataloguing them, one beat at a time.

She said: “One of the things I started last year was to specialise in a different instrument each month. The first one was a hand drum from India called a kanjira, then an Irish bodhran, and so on. Not only did it mean I was learning about them, but I was also using different muscle groups and that’s important.

“It kept me buoyant and curious, otherwise you can stagnate. It’s like being a sportsperson, you have to keep going. I play something every day, which is not possible when out on tour, but that’s been one of the wonderful things about being at home – I’ve been able to have time with an instrument, to experiment.

“I’ll never get through all the instruments, but as far as keeping both sides of the brain going and keeping my limbs functioning and talking to each other, it’s really good. Even if you’re not in this profession, to have a basic drum kit – just a snare, high-hat and bass drum – would do wonders for a person’s whole wellbeing.”

Virtuoso percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie

Evelyn embarked on her painstaking database project last March.

“I’m going through each instrument one at a time, which allows me to hold it, play it, have a good look at it, rekindling my curiosity,” she explained. “There are some from my travels, but then I’ve had some made for me and others given to me by people who no longer knew what to do with them. There are big collections elsewhere in the world and those have always inspired me.

“I love having an instrument – they are like pieces of art but playable, usable and they have a story. I’ll keep collecting for as long as I can and for as long as I feel I can use them. To catalogue them is to allow future generations to see, touch and learn from them.”

From The Proms at the Royal Albert Hall to the opening ceremony of the Olympics, Evelyn is accustomed to playing in front of huge crowds, and while she is missing the experience of live performance, she is appreciating other aspects of being off tour.

“To wake up in the same bed for such a long time has been wonderful and I haven’t missed the travel or process of getting a visa,” she admitted. “I really enjoy being at home and I appreciate it. I enjoy getting into a routine, which is something I haven’t experienced since school. Getting up at the same time, structuring my day, it’s been really nice. I’ve enjoyed it and I still am, I’m getting lots done.”

Evelyn, who grew up in Aberdeenshire and has been profoundly deaf since her childhood, misses performing to live audiences, but having just postponed concerts that were pencilled in for later in 2021, she now doesn’t expect to be back on stage again until 2022. But, she has no fewer than three new albums out.

There’s Concertos For Mallet Instruments, with the City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong, a double concerto for trombone and percussion by Christian Lindberg, and finally, coming out in late February, a completely improvised recording with a Danish guitarist and an Iranian daf (a traditional Iranian frame drum) player. Evelyn is so busy right now it’s hard to imagine how she will find the time to return to a life on the road, but she vows she will.

In the meantime, she is also collaborating on a reggae track, working on the soundtrack to a film called Sound Of Metal, which is about a drummer who begins to lose his hearing, and she has taken up the role of president for Help Musicians, the charity that supports professional musicians from their time starting out in the industry through to retirement. As you might imagine, the organisation has been inundated over the past year.

Education, too, has always been important to Evelyn and she has taken part in a number of virtual consultations, working with primary school-age children and upwards. Away from the classroom, she feels each of us will learn from the experiences of the pandemic and believes good will eventually emerge from a bleak situation. She added: “We are all listening much more and paying far more attention. We’re listening to everyone’s stories and there is a greater emphasis on listening to our environment.

“We are cooped up in our own environments more, so are having to find ways to inspire ourselves and provoke curiosity within our immediate environment.

“As for my profession, it’s opened up a different kind of education with regards to how we prepare our students. When they graduate, it’s not enough to just have been playing their instruments for years and not be prepared for anything else.

“I think things will change in the industry, for the better. Everything always needs time to develop. We’ve seen change in the recording industry over many years as technology has developed, and we’ve adapted and embraced that, and it will be the same with this situation.

“Musicians won’t think in quite the same way after this, or be taught in the same way.

“Young folk will be much more clued in as to what they need to be prepared for in such a situation, because this could happen again for whatever reason.

“It’s a great opportunity for schools, higher education, institutions and the professional industry to really embrace all the possibilities that come from that, even though there has been a lot of pain and hardship.

“There is always a yin and yang in everything, and I feel quite positive about the future, to be honest.”

I was so lucky to go to a school where everyone got to play music

Between recording three albums and mastering every instrument in her 2,500-strong collection, Dame Evelyn Glennie has also found time to launch a podcast exploring how we listen.

The series of in-depth conversations features high-level performers including Irvine-born violinist Nicola Benedetti, and comedian and Strictly Come Dancing winner Bill Bailey.

Each episode sees Evelyn’s guest discuss their idea of what listening is and their interpretation of sound.

It is a subject that means a great deal to Evelyn, who grew up in Aberdeenshire and has been deaf since she was 12. She believes listening involves the whole body, not just our ears.

“I was so lucky at Ellon Academy, where they encouraged anyone to play music. It was the medical profession that felt it wouldn’t be possible and there was a conflict there,” she said.

“But technological advancements have led to a different definition of what a deaf person experiences in 2021.

“As for the podcast, we recorded the first series before the pandemic. We’ve already done a second and third and are about to start a fourth.

“I wanted a mix of guests in order to find out what listening means to a comedian, musician, sportsperson, and so on.

“It’s been interesting listening to their responses and a lot of learning tools can be picked up from the conversations, which I certainly feel have been worthwhile.”