Music

Does anyone out there ride to music?

I've seen some dressage musical freestyles, and I would LOVE to try one sometime. There's, um, only a limited amount you can do at my level - you basically get three tempos! - but at the upper levels it's amazing. If you have never seen the famous freestyle from Blue Hors Matine ridden by Andreas Helgstrand, do yourself a favor and go watch it.

On the other hand, I watched a fellow member of my pony club practicing her Training-level musical freestyle on her big warmblood mare, and it was so cool. You don't have to ride at a super high level to be able to put some really good music to your ride - the girl in my club did a freestyle to music from the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack, and it was awesome. So every once in awhile I go through all my music and think, "Hmm, this would be fun to work into a freestyle...Ooh, and this one too..." But, I've never actually gotten around to doing it.

Sometime in the next few weeks I'm going to bring my mp3 player to the barn and try riding to some of those songs so I can get a sense for what Pandora's tempo is at each gait. Then, who knows - maybe I will put together a simple little freestyle, just for fun! I think it would be enjoyable. Not to mention that extra help with a solid rhythm can never hurt.

I imagine it's quite hard to balance choosing songs that you like and songs that would work well for a freestyle. If you watch the video I linked to, there was a medley of several different songs, none with vocals. I've done similar performances at the band leadership camp I attend every summer - only it's called a specialty, and it's done with conducting, marching, or flagwork. Each year I do a partner specialty with the girl who was my co-drum major, and it's a lot of fun. So far we've done them to AC/DC's "Dirty Deeds," the Prince Ali song from Aladdin, and Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out for a Hero." I think the Aladdin one was my favorite, as we worked in a lot of funny things.

Words work well for that, since you need some material to act out while working in conducting at the same time. You can't exactly act things out with a horse, though, so maybe it would be better to do a song without lyrics.

There's an instrumental song I love - I think it's the theme from Boondock Saints - but it's rather distinctly Irish and would be definitely more suited to someone riding an Irish Draught or Irish Sport Horse.

Anyway, I'll let you know once I figure out some tempos and good songs to use.

Anyone else ride to music, for performance or just for fun while you're schooling? Do you find it helps you settle into a rhythm? Has anyone performed a musical freestyle before?