Music

2021 was a year without many of the regular performance opportunities for the children. The pandemic saw the cancellation of many school concerts and performances. This meant the year took on a rather different focus.

An important part of the Music curriculum programme is listening and viewing live performance. During the first term, the Preparatory School attended the opera Don Pasquale (Donizetti) performed by New Zealand Opera in the school Centennial Chapel. This was an adapted opera, but still retained the main structure of the storyline. Students were entertained by a small cast of opera soloists. The opera was presented in costume and with a set. The opportunity for our students to see and hear live opera is invaluable and helps build a secure musical appreciation foundation for the future.

In June, the two Year 6 classes participated in the Strum Strike Blow Festival at the Christchurch Arena, alongside 1000 children from other Christchurch schools. This is an annual one-day festival with rehearsals during the day and culminating in an evening concert. Children are taught pieces on either the ukulele, recorder, or a mallet instrument (xylophone and marimba). The classes learnt five recorder pieces for the event, including a massed item piece Strumshine by composer, Michael Bell, that combined the three instruments. A feature of the chosen pieces of music is the provision of multi-level music parts, thus catering to the range of music abilities and extending children who are more musically able. A highlight for the children was being part of 1000 children playing massed items of music together. This is always a popular event, and a positive way for the children to perform to a live audience.

All our Preparatory School music groups perform frequently within our school community and Christchurch music community to audiences. In July, the Preparatory School Concert was presented in our Centennial Chapel. The concert

featured the Junior School Choir, Cantare Choir, Preparatory School Orchestra, Preparatory School Chamber Trio, and items from our two Year 8 school Music scholars, Anya Fang and Jessica Drury. This concert is a celebration of music making in our Preparatory School. The two heads of the Cantare Choir scripted and compered the evening. The Junior Choir presented a performance of the work Reflections of a lad at sea. The Ghost Ship song from this collection became a choir favourite. The Chamber Trio performed Dmitri Shostakovich’s 5 pieces for two violins and piano. This was a magnificent concert and even more treasured as music performances for the rest of the year were cancelled because of COVID-19 restrictions.

In August the national lockdown saw the return of online learning for three weeks. This presented a unique set of challenges as children did not have access to musical instruments. New Entrant to Year 3 and Year 5 classes continued their Music learning through the Kodaly musical pedagogy. This is a system of music learning that is vocally based focusing on the development of musicianship skills. The transition from school to home-based learning for these classes was almost seamless. The lessons were videoed and then posted on the school Seesaw learning platform. A positive aspect to presenting lessons in video form is that the students were able to see and hear their music learning. Year 4 children continued with their recorder class tuition via videos posted on Seesaw, while the children in the violin project programme had lesson material emailed to them. Reading music notation was the learning focus for the Year 6 children. During this period the Cantare Choir rehearsals were held using the Zoom platform. The choir worked on learning the song repertoire for The Christchurch Schools’ Music Festival. Unfortunately for the second year in a row, the music festival event became another casualty that had to be cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions.

The Cantare Choir were able to continue to sing as a choir, with some modifications, despite the COVID-19 restrictions. The choir took more of a vocal lead at the Tuesday morning chapel services, being the only group in the school permitted to sing. This took some getting used to.

The Advent chapel service in the fourth term was a musical highlight of the year. This was presented as a morning service with the entire school processing into the Chapel past the choir singing the carol Little Donkey, and a static Nativity display. Once in the Chapel, Year 8 soloists sung the first verse of the carol Once in Royal David’s City. Descants to the Advent carols were sung by the Year 8 students while the remainder of the choir sung the tune. The Junior Choir also performed, singing the carol Bethlehem Night accompanied by two Year 5 students playing on the xylophone.

Curriculum Music and Music performance groups in the Preparatory School are well resourced and are supported by skilled and experienced staff. I would like to acknowledge the musical support and skill provided by Jane Radford, not only in the Preparatory School but also in the Secondary School. Jane has tutored the Preparatory School chamber group and supported the Junior Orchestra and Junior Choir. Our children have been most fortunate to have had Jane assisting with musical groups and have benefited greatly from her musical skill and experience.