Music

Tifanny Richards, principal viola for the National Youth Orchestra.

GENERAL NOTES

Much of this year has been spent in looking forward to the tour to Germany by the School Choir and Senior Band in late summer. In practical terms this has meant rehearsing and preparing repertoire and focusing our attention on raising the level of performance ready for touring.

During the year there have been some notable performances including Tifanny Richards' account of Hoffmeister's viola concerto with the School orchestra, Charles Barlow conducting Purcell's Chacony for strings, Martin Kershaw's performance of a set of variations for clarinet by Jean Francaix and Andrew Moxon and Claire Altman playing Vivaldi's double flute concerto; also the success of Six Appeal — Christopher Braganza, Timothy Dunn, James Fieldsend, Miles Layram and Stephanie Sanderson — in the Daily Telegraph's Jazz Competition, testifies to the high standards achieved by our musicians.

The string orchestra continued to perform well as their performances of Handel's Concerto Grosso in G and Leroy Anderson's 'Jazz Pizzicato' in February demonstrated, and Kathryn Wood's leadership has been first-rate. The symphony orchestra's accounts in the Summer Concert of Eric Coates' 'Westwards' and Ronald Binge's 'Elizabethan Serenade' were lively and controlled. The provision of proper rehearsal time for a symphony orchestra is still a problem and an experiment of placing this early on a Monday evening next Easter term will be tried.

The visit of the Royal Artillery Band at the end of May was exciting; the two concerts during the day which many pupils from the Senior and Junior Schools attended were exhilarating affairs and with Sousa marches like 'Stars and Stripes' and film music like 'Lawrence of Arabia' they could not fail to please.

This year has seen a healthy increase to eight pupils studying 'A'-Level music in the sixth form. With this increase has come a greater awareness and wish to have influence on the music performed which is to be welcomed.

In all areas of the music department the work of the full-time staff is greatly valued — Roger Carrington's help with the String Orchestra and string tuition, Keith Pemberton's continual administrative and accompanimental help, but especially this year Jeffrey Gray's extra help with band work and orchestral work resulting from our being short of one member of staff.

Many of our senior pupils are increasingly becoming involved in decision-making and the day to day running of the music department which is a most pleasing development. We hope that those who leave us this year will continue their music involvement and interest and thank them for all their contributions to the musical life of the School.

The music annexe (Methodist Building) is now used in an increasing variety of ways — for teaching, rehearsing both during the day and the evening and by a wide variety of groups including choirs, bands, pop groups, orchestras and jazz groups. This demonstrates the need for areas specifically designed for these activities.

The Choral Society's main concert this year was a performance of Handel's 'Messiah'; the School orchestra's ability to cope with the demands made by this was excellent to see and the experiment involving all the Junior School's J4 classes in most of the choruses proved a success. Schubert's Mass in G was the main work in the Autumn together with two large-scale anthems — Mendelssohn's 'Hear my Prayer' and Bairstow's 'Blessed City' — both conducted with authority by Jeffrey Gray and sympathetically accompanied by Keith Pemberton on the organ.

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During the year the repertoire for Germany had to be learnt or relearnt. The John Rutter folk song arrangements were revived at the Germany Plus evening together with the first presentation of 'Blow, blow, thou winter wind' whose haunting delicacy was immediately appealing to the choir.

At the Christmas Concert one of the carols 'So gentle the donkey' with its simple rhythm but beautiful line was perhaps the highlight of the singing that evening.

In March a gospel choir from Bremen, who were going to be our hosts in Germany, came to stay with us. They sang a whole range of spirituals together with some folk-song arrangements while the School choir joined in with 'Joshua fit the battle' and a real winner — Rutter's 'Down by the riverside' where the choirs joined together.

In the Summer Term the choir performed in two concerts. The first in May saw a performance of Kodaly's 'See the gypsies' which stretched the choir in new directions and Elgar's 'As torrents in Summer' displayed its increasing fullness of sound. In the Sommer Musikfest — a concert anticipating our tour to Germany — the choir's performances of 'The Hills' and 'Greater Love' by John Ireland together with 'Hail, gladdening light' by Charles Wood were some of the outstanding features of the evening.

The Commemoration Service also saw the choir in excellent form but perhaps the most satisfying performance of all in that last week was of Charles Wood's 'O thou the central orb' at the Leavers' service.

Keith Pemberton and Jeffrey Gray have provided invaluable help during the year with accompaniments and group training and also this year David Riley and Ruth McCartney-Moore have provided vocal coaching, all of which contributed to rising standards.

After the first Choral Evensong of the year in October when the choir sang Stanford's 'Magnificat' and 'Nunc Dimittis in C and Herbert Howells' anthem 'O Pray for the peace of Jerusalem' (the words of which became increasingly significant in the following months) it was clear that the choir was reaching new levels of achievement. The confidence and range of the sopranos has.been one of the most encouraging features of the choir's performances together with the increasing richness of the sometimes over-enthusiastic bass section. The tenors are also developing and some of the younger voices here bode well for the future. The alto line has had problems but by the end of the year was returning to good form.

The Carol Service in the Minster went especially well and our experiment of thirteenth century chant sung in antiphonal procession down the nave with brass organumlike interludes together with tabor from the west end gave an exciting start to the service. What was especially pleasing was that at the end of the service it was very clear that the choir understood clearly the high standards that they had just achieved.

The Senior Band, like the choir, has during the year had its mind set on the Germany tour. The reading ability of the band has developed greatly as new repertoire was prepared; in fact, of the fifteen pieces performed during the year, twelve were new to the band including complicated arrangements such as Gershwin's 'American in Paris', Bernstein's 'West Side Story Suite' and Malcolm Arnold's 'English Dance'. When confronted with some of these new pieces the band faltered, groaned then accepted the challenge and displayed their real potential as the year progressed.

Some of the most enjoyable performances were of 'Allied Honour' where the band's enthusiasm was clearly evident, 'Sandpaper Ballet' where the sandpapers provided novel entertainment and Edward Gregson's 'Prelude for an occasion' which saw the band tackling difficult, original modern music in a professional way. An arrangement of the Bach chorale 'Our Father' posed real problems of precise slow counting which were overcome as another area in the band developed. A workshop with the Royal Artillery Band, when they visited the School in May, was a real tonic for our band. Being coached by real professionals and seeing what standards we are all aiming at was a very special experience.

In the Sommer Musikfest, 'Unter der Admirals Flagge' was revived and proved a blockbuster start to the programme and this together with the 'West Side Story Suite' saw Jeffrey Gray getting the very best out of the band.

My thanks go to Janus Wadsworth whose help and band expertise has been invaluable and to Jeffrey Gray whose conducting of the band in the Summer Term in preparation for Germany has been so evidently successful.

This year's Music Competition was adjudicated by David Bowman, former Director of Music at Ampleforth College. His ability to get straight to the heart of each performance and discuss it with special perceptiveness made this a particularly memorable event this year.

CELEBRITY CONCERTS

Three celebrity concerts have been promoted this year. In the Autumn Term the Ryedale Festival Wind Ensemble gave us a delightful evening including Mozart's Serenade in C Minor and Gounod's Petite Symphonie for Wind.

In the Spring Term a most versatile group of singers visited us — the Balfour chorus. All ex-choral scholars from Magdalen College, they managed to produce a remarkable range of sounds. Their arrangements of sixties and seventies pop music was quite dazzling in complexity but tremendously effective. It was high quality stuff.

Towards the end of the Summer Term Roundelay, two musicians specializing in early instruments, gave an intriguing concert, the title of which was 'Battles, Prayers and Lamentations' from the Crusades to the Civil War. We heard the beautiful sounds of the gemshorn, the gentle grind of hurdy gurdies, an array of drums including nakers and a range of string instruments culminating in delightful performances on lute and bass viol.

The audiences for these concerts have not been large but have been most enthusiastic.

MUSIC STAFF

Bill Riley's serious illness just before the beginning of the School year was a major cause of worry but fortunately Bill left the danger list fairly soon and embarked on a gradual recovery. Bill Riley has given notable service to the Music Department over many years and will be remembered with special regard by many Peterites who either studied brass instruments with him or played in one of the bands. We wish him a very happy retirement.

My thanks go to Charles Brewer, Janus Wadsworth, Ian Davies and Christopher Bacon who all helped fill the gap in brass teaching. Also to the new staff who joined us this year: Christine Hodson ('cello), Sharon Brown (percussion), and Diana Chapman (flute). At the end of the Summer Term we bade farewell to three of our instrumental teachers: Malcolm Brown ('cello), Colin Honour (clarinet), and Brian Richards (clarinet). We wish them all well and thank them for their work for the department.

The third annual Music Staff Concert in June showed what a talented and dedicated group of instrumental teachers we have and we thank them for their hard work in developing the musical life of the School.