Creative Arts

Art & Photography By Mr Iain Young, Head of Art In our first year without the disruptions of Covid, it has been a pleasure to return to taking trips away from the College and allowing the pupils to experience art at first hand once again.

Our A Level students pioneered the way with a trip to the Natural History museum in London, shared with our friends from the DT department. Not to be outdone, our GCSE pupils followed quickly on their heels with

a visit to the Tate Modern allowing them to start the research which is so essential to their coursework.

Not only could pupils now go out on visit, but speakers made a welcome return to our curriculum. Photographer and Architect Nick Collins came to speak about the skills needed by a street photographer to a crowd eager to pick up tips. With a trip to Oxford to put these new skills into action on the following day, they were certainly keen to learn what they could. Artists with an eye for the classical also spent time in the Artists were also active in providing new large-scale works to be seen around the campus, big canvases were hung in the Medical Centre and the Sports Hall to general acclaim. Each celebrated the themes associated

with their location and brightened some otherwise slightly drab areas.

Ashmolean, Britain’s oldest public museum. The final major event of the year marks the return

of the annual Art Exhibition, not as by tradition on

Founders’ Day, but a welcome return to normality.

Next year looks to be even busier, with a scheme to offer arts awards to interested pupils and plans for a visit to New York in the New Year.

DT By Mr Craig Wiles, Head of DT The Design Technology department has had a bit of a technological uplift this year. We have taken delivery of a number of new machines that will drive forward the progression of a STEM offering within the department’s curriculum.

They include three 3D printers, one of which will allow us to print to the precision and quality of dental implants, a CNC router and a Vinyl Cutter. Each of

these machines is driven by a computer aided design application which the students in Year 10 and Lower

Sixth have been busy learning throughout the course of the year.

We have already put the machines to use on a number of occasions, including two DT Outreach days for two local primary schools. Year 5 pupils were able to design

and make watches with 3D printed cases.

As the need to produce a physical prototype was removed from this year’s examination groups, a number of pupils didn’t produce a product at the end of the course which, although disappointing, gave the greatest chance of success come results day. That said, we still had some outstanding work produced and our pupils should be immensely proud of what they achieved in a tumultuous year, especially for a subject so

incapacitated during the last two years of the pandemic.

With the department starting an A Level course in September, and a switch to Eduqas GCSE next year, lots

of planning has been undertaken in order to support our transition to these courses. A bespoke sewing studio has also been created to accommodate a textiles offering at GCSE level, allowing us to suit the needs of our learners

to a greater capacity.

Finally, we had a number of outstanding scholarship

applications this year, resulting in two DT Scholars and two Exhibition pupils being successful in their

applications - well done to them!

Music By Mr Chris McDade, Director of Music The Lent and Summer Terms have been very busy times for the musicians at Pangbourne and it has been fantastic to return to more live music making as the year has progressed.

Dunbar Events

In early February, pupils in Dunbar held an inaugural

Inter-Watch Music competition. Having rehearsed their chosen watch songs over a period of four weeks, the final event saw a very high standard of music making

in what became a keenly contested competition. Our Adjudicator, Mr Malcolm Gunningham (Director of

Music, St Andrew’s Pangbourne) was impressed by

both the quality and enthusiasm of the performers. Congratulations to the winning soloist Maisie Stephenson (Starboard watch) and to For’Ard watch for

being crowned overall winners on the evening for their performance of ‘Happy’ by Pharrell Williams. The performance of ‘Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat’ was a tremendous success and, to a large and appreciative audience, the whole of Dunbar performed the ‘short’ version of the wellknown Lloyd-Webber musical with much enthusiasm and gusto. Special mention must be made of our two soloists, Sophia Newborough and Finn Willis who both

excelled on the evening. Their reprise of their songs the following morning to the Senior school also went down a storm! My thanks to Mrs Elly Hayward

(Head of English) for all her help and support with

the production.

Senior Musicians

Several of our more advanced musicians gave an excellent concert in the Recital Hall in March with a varied programme which included singers, pianists and guitarists and even included performances of pupils’ own compositions. In the final week of the Summer

Term, we held a Summer Serenade evening in the Chapel at which many of our Senior leaving musicians had the opportunity to perform. It was a very moving evening of high quality music making, marking the final appearances of several of our Senior musicians

as they leave the College. We thank all of them for the significant contribution that they have made to

Pangbourne Music over the years.

The Marching Band has continued to lead the parades

on College Sundays and their playing remains as ‘top drawer’ as ever. In the final parade of the year, they

were front and centre, playing a range of music from the traditional repertoire of the Sunset ceremony to some challenging and Latin-American influenced

arrangements! My sincere thanks to Mr Andrew

Thornhill, Head of Instrumental Music and Mr John Donnelly, Drum teacher, for their expert leadership and tutelage.

Music Scholars and Exam Students

As part of our wider programme of activities, the Music Scholars and students in the exam groups went to see a production of Mozart’s comic opera, ‘Cosi Fan Tutti’

at the Coliseum with English National Opera. The

performance was truly electric with many young artists making their Opera debuts – a great inspiration for many of our own musicians.

Several students have taken practical exams over the past two terms and we have enjoyed considerable

success in the exams – many congratulations to all those students who have gained excellent marks in a range of instruments and grade levels with the ABRSM,

Trinity and Rock School.

Falkland Islands Memorial Service

It was a privilege to be involved in the 40th Anniversary Service to mark the cessation of the conflict in the South

Atlantic. The College Choir were in top form as they led the music in the services. They sang two anthems; Charles Wood’s ‘O thou the central orb’ and a new composition, ‘O Almighty God’ (a prayer for Seafarers)

written for the service by Christopher Tambling. Most ably supported by our organist, Mr Ian Hockley, it was also a pleasure to welcome an excellent Brass Quintet

from Her Majesty’s Royal Marines Band, Collingwood.

Visiting Music Teachers

As ever, we owe a huge debt of thanks to our marvellous team of Visiting Music Teachers who have been at the

forefront of enabling so many of our young musicians to flourish this year. I thank them all for their hard work and

dedication to our pupils. At the end of the Summer Term we bade farewell to Mrs Scarlett Palys who has taught singing at the College for many years – her pupils have benefitted from her expert guidance and support and I

thank her for her service to the College.

Drama By Ms Rebecca Atack, Head of Drama The Drama department has been as busy as ever in 2022.

We kicked off the year with the GCSE Component 2

Scripted exam on 28 January. Our 24 GCSE pupils had

been working hard on their scripted pieces with texts including ‘Metamorphosis’ by Steven Berkoff, ‘Daisy

pulls it off’ by Denise Deegan, ‘Blood Brothers’ by

Willy Russell, ‘Neville’s Island’ by Peter Firth and ‘Blue

Remembered Hills’ by Dennis Potter. We had a visiting examiner come in and all the pupils did their very best.

Close on the heels of the GCSE scripted exam came

the College Production. ‘Great Expectations’ was

performed on 8, 9, 10 February and this adaptation was

not only written, but also directed by our very own Miss Bland. We had 26 pupils from Years 7 to Upper

Sixth performing and four pupils who worked backstage. We had excellent performances from all pupils, notably Phoebe Curcher as Mrs Havisham, Nora Shields as Magwitch and Harriet Papworth as Pip.

Joseph De Halpert did an excellent job of running the

performance from backstage as our Deputy Stage Manager, guiding our Year 7 pupil Rosie Parbutt and Year 9 pupil Adam Simms as they operated the sound,

media and lighting desks. Ms Atack and Miss Bland

were ably helped by Josie Spalton who helped with scene and costume changes. Next year’s production will be ‘Chicago’.

On 10 March we enjoyed our Year 9 pupils’

performance of ‘Face’ adapted by Benjiman Zephaniah

and Richard Conlon. Each class had a section of the full

play to perform which they had been rehearsing during curriculum time. As so often happens when we have 89

pupils to prepare, some pupils felt more confident than

others, some had done a better job of learning their

lines as others and some were unfortunately ill on the performance day, but all the pupils involved learnt from their experience and surprised themselves by actually enjoying the event! The following week we had 13

pupils take their Drama Trinity exams. All pupils passed including nine merits and three distinctions.

In April, we had the A Level Component 2 exam which allowed the pupils to explore a photograph by Jan Saudek entitled ‘David, Lonely Forever’ and Joe Orton’s

play ‘The Ruffian on the Stairs’.

In June, we had our Summer Showcase. Ellie Buckley

had adapted Mary Poppins for our Dunbar pupils, aided by Oliver Hodgson, and both Year 11 pupils directed

and choreographed it. To finish the year off, we had the

Year 10 Component 1 practical exam which was a great

celebration of their hard work and commitment.

We are already looking forward to next year!