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From here you can view or download past copies of our 'Music Notes' newsletter.
Music Notes November 03 |
Read here about our first full term of activities at Ashburton Learning Village
The Orchestral Centre started the new term in September at a new venue, new time and on a different day! Despite initial problems getting to Ashburton in time for rehearsal, it seemed Croydon decided to dig up the entire area at once, we have now settled in and made ourselves at home.
The end of term concert on 8 December was attended by the Mayor, Councillors and the Director of Education. We were congratulated on a fine performance and there were lots of encouraging features to the playing and some excellent individual solos in the Youth Orchestra.
The Youth Orchestra have a demanding schedule next term with a performance of Dvorak’s 8 Symphony on Friday 23 March at Ashburton and a staged concert of West Side Story at the Fairfield Hall on 8 March at the CMS Showcase Concert. The Sinfonia has a similarly demanding schedule, performing Haydn’s Symphony No 104 with wind and percussion on 23 March at Ashburton, and a performance of string music at Fairfield on 19 March as part of the Croydon Schools Music Association Festival. Preparations are also well underway for the Orchestral Centre’s tour to Lisbon, Portugal in July 2007 which promises to be an exciting end to the year.
The past few months have been very busy at Croydon Young Musicians. We were the first Centre to move into the Learning Village and we quickly settled in to our new surroundings, appreciating having our own home. Last term we said goodbye to the members of the CYM Symphony Orchestra. They have moved on to the Orchestral Centre and the Wind and Percussion Centre.
This term has seen exciting changes at CYM. We now have Workshops for Strings, Wind, Brass and Percussion, aimed at children playing from an elementary to Grade 2, or Silver Music Medal standard. Children are given the opportunity to play in smaller instrument-specific groups as well as in larger ensembles. They are then able to progress to our Concert Band or String Orchestra. In addition to these groups we are also home to the Centre for Endangered Species and, from January, the Centre for Asian Music. Musicianship classes leading to Grade 5 Theory are held at 9.00 am.
The Vocal and Creative Workshops are a new development at CYM. These take place in the middle of the morning and involve the whole Centre, and are aimed at developing aural and musicianship skills. The National Strategy for Music Education has some exciting ideas concerning the development of musicianship through the voice, and children can join in and sing, no matter how inexperienced they may be instrumentally. The older children attend the Creative Workshop, where they learn about improvisation, composition and sight singing. Not only are these important in developing rounded musicians but also are included in Associated Board, Guildhall and Trinity exams and Music Medals.
The Croydon Music Service Winter Concert on Saturday 9 December 2006 at Ashburton Learning Village celebrated and showcased the new look Wind and Percussion Centre. The successful and entertaining concert featured the newly formed Brass ensembles and Clarinet ensembles as well as the firmly established Fluteharmonic and Youth Winds (formally CYWO) with a guest performance from the Guitar Ensemble. The first half of the concert showcased the varied music the brass and clarinet ensembles had prepared this term and in the second half we heard the brilliant Fluteharmonic and the energetic Youth Winds.
Following the move to Ashburton Learning Village in April and the restructuring of the centre in September things have now settled and the pupils have had the opportunity to hone and extend their playing skills while experiencing a number of new ensembles. Under the guidance of the CMS staff the pupils have been developing more confidence and independence in their ensemble playing while enjoying the social side of the centre. The brass have been working in two groups, the Brass Ensemble with Mike Brown and the Brass Choir with Martin Grainger, while the Clarinet Ensemble and Choir have worked both jointly and separately with Genessa West and David Rompani. The Percussion Ensemble have been developing their playing with Dave Barry while the Fluteharmonic have continued to maintain their high standard of performance with Carolyn Kelly and Rebecca Carey. The Youth Winds have developed musically and technically in addition to exploring and playing the core Wind Band repertoire under the baton of David Rompani.
This term saw the first outing of our new contra-bass clarinet funded by the H.R. Taylor Charitable Trust. The contra-bass clarinet has enabled the full instrumentation required for a Clarinet Choir in addition to adding a whole new depth and colour to the Youth Winds. In a concert or rehearsal you really can’t miss it - it’s rather large and the player has to sit on a number of chairs to reach the mouthpiece! Pupils in the centre ensembles have the opportunity to try and borrow the more exotic members of the clarinet, flute and saxophone families as well as larger instruments like bassoons, tubas and tuned percussion.
From January 2007 the centre will also include a Stage Band for any player interested in Jazz, Latin and Popular music. This is a great opportunity for pupils with second study brass, percussion and wind instruments to try something different. Future plans for the centre include developing the Percussion Ensemble to include such activities like Samba and African Drumming and a tour in Summer 2008 for all centre members.
Next term we have a major concert for the centre at the Fairfield Halls, Thursday 8 March 2007, as part of the CMS Showcase where the whole centre will be performing.
The two groups in the Centre for Young Guitarists moved to the same day at Ashburton in September. Thanks to the hard work of CMS guitar teachers we had a very respectable turn out for the Croydon Youth Guitar Workshop open day in November. The guitar can be a rather solitary instrument and pupils gain much from working with other guitarists. The group worked on Indonesian Gamelan music and the evening was rounded off with rousing Russian Cossack style piece. The result of the workshop was that more pupils have joined the ensemble and are enjoying working at Ashburton Village. We say a big thank you to guitar teacher Philip Legg who has worked for many years with the ensemble. Philip is unable to continue due to other commitments and we would like to thank him for his dedicated support.
The Croydon Youth Guitar Ensemble is an established group of keen acoustic guitarists who have been together for a few years. We are pleased to welcome the added support of CMS guitar teacher, James Gibbard. His introduction has allowed the group to work on some small ensemble projects at a higher musical level. We are aiming to develop some pupil led material, either original of arrangements and are working on Music Futures projects. The group has been invited to tour Portugal with (please add here Graeme) in the summer.
Flute Success Claire Wickes, 15, who has been a member of Croydon Youth Fluteharmonic for 5 years and attends St. Andrews School, has recently become co-principal of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. She has also won a place at the prestigious Chetham's School in Manchester, a specialist music school, to study there in the 6th Form from September 2007. Her teacher, Carolyn Kelly says "not only is she outstanding player but an excellent role model for other flute players whether at school or at Fluteharmonic. Beth Wilcock, who has also been a member of the NYO has just been offered a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music (and Royal College of Music) starting in Sept. 2007, and she almost missed the audition due to illness! Places at this prestigious conservatoire are like gold dust as they only offer about 4 places each year.
Croydon Teachers Expertise in demand Carolyn Kelly writes, "I was invited to speak at the British Flute Society, International Convention in August. It was held at the Royal Northern college of Music in Manchester.
The first afternoon was devoted to a Teachers Forum and I chose to speak about working for a Music Service; Group Teaching/Music Medals and The Croydon Fife Scheme. I had some good feedback afterwards and lots of informal chats to other teachers, about the various implications of the way we do things in our particular Music Services. We had a discussion at the end about the recorder and the fife. Whilst I have no grudge towards the recorder, I favour the fife for children who had chosen the flute so that they have a good embouchure shape for progressing from one to the other.
The Presentations and Recitals were wonderful and quite simply World Class. Trevor Wye, the Programme Manager had invited the top flute players from countries around the world. Unfortunately three had to pull out due to the Heathrow problems but were replaced. We are so lucky in the flute world to have so many player/composers, such as Mike Mower/Ian Clarke/Dave Heath. The standard of the piano playing was magnificent with names such as Clifford Benson and Richard Shaw and Tim Carey.
Almost every genre and musical era were represented. We even had Stephen Preston, the baroque flute specialist doing avant garde music representing bird calls, a young Russian player, Denis Boriakov, who studied at the Royal Academy with William Bennett, chose to perform three pieces originally written for the violin. He had a standing ovation. Some people commented that they hadn't heard flute playing like in 50 years. We had warm ups and hot ups in the morning at 7.00am (not that I went); there was yoga and body mapping on offer; flute choir sessions with Atarah Ben Tovim or Julie Wright or Robin Soldan. There was something for everyone, including a Convention Supper and a Celebrity Recital in honour of William Bennett's 70th birthday. Trevor Wye presented him with a 'one carrot' flute...which he carved out of a carrot in front of our eyes."
Cornelius Bruinsma writes, "I have been working with Helen Bretherick and Fred Scott on developing a SoundStart Wider Opportunities project at St Thomas Becket RC Primary School. The success of this project has interested guitar teachers all over the country and I was asked to do the opening presentation at the annual meeting of EGTA (the European Guitar Teachers Association). Many teachers were actively involved trying out all the musical activities and games that are used in SoundStart. An open forum discussed the benefits of wider opportunities and the challenges that it presents to teachers to deliver the government pledge that all primary pupils should have access to instrumental lessons. The following newsletter to EGTA members has created more interest, and I have been invited to deliver the same presentation to other music services. In Croydon Davidson Primary School has also taken up the SoundStart Guitar and Keyboard programme and we are busy practising for the CMS Showcase 8 March.
April 4 – 8, Centre for Young Pianists Tour to Greece This is what the British Ambassador said at the end of the Athens concert, “As British Ambassador, I have a great deal of pride in seeing so many wonderful young performers coming to Greece and performing before an audience and providing such wonderful music. I think tonight we have heard a series of absolutely breathtaking performances – wonderful music, of course, but also great technical skill and real depth of feeling. You ought to take great pride in what you have achieved here tonight. You have brought great credit tonight to our country, you have been a great credit to the Piano Centre, and most of all and most importantly you have been a great credit to yourselves. Talent I know is not enough – with it goes a great deal of hard work, and I admire you as much for your commitment and your dedication as I do for your talent. Thank you very much indeed for entertaining us so well tonight”.
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Pictured are members of the Centre for Young Pianists with the British Ambassador and his wife and the Director of the Conservatoire. | |
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Wednesday 29 March, Youth Music Showcase Concert at Fairfield The theme for the concert was Wider Opportunities. It has been a term used in music education over recent years for the government pledge to offer every child the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, and the Showcase Concert was a chance for us to show what it means in practice.
The Recorder Group (directed by Bronia Parry) were an example of the first opportunity to learn a musical instrument in school. Some of the pupils learn through CMS’s nationally acclaimed SoundStart whole class instrumental teaching programme, some through the CMS small group teaching scheme, and some are taught by school members of staff.
After an initial instrumental learning experience for all, those who wish are able to go on to further study, perhaps on a new instrument. Clarinets R Cool (directed by David Rompani) and Virtuoso Violins (directed by Simon Lock) showed us what can be achieved after a few years of learning.
The real enjoyment of music is in making music with others, and the Centre for Endangered Species (directed by Bronia Parry) encourages this in two ways. Oboe, bassoon and double bass pupils have traditionally had a lonely time in the first years of learning, but by coming together for lessons they can now experience the same enjoyment that other pupils have. It is also important to encourage these minority instruments because they are so vital to the bands and orchestras which young musicians will wish to join as they progress.
Wider Opportunities is also relevant to class music lessons. Pupils are able to experience and explore an increasingly wide range of musical forms and styles. The Junior Stomp project from Thomas More School gave the audience a chance to experience music lessons at secondary school! The second half included two of our senior groups. The Croydon Youth Symphonic Winds (conducted by James Warburton) and the Croydon Youth Orchestra (conducted by Bronia Parry) They may look like a traditional band and orchestra, performing music ranging form Shostakovich’s Festive Overture and Piano Concerto (soloist Yuriko Kato from the Centre for Young Pianists), but for them we are also developing wider opportunities and experiences using ideas such as those we learnt about at a National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain open event just two weeks earlier. |
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