After the House Music Unplugged finals the previous week, Big School was the venue for the second set of finals of the House Music competition. This is a competition for individual instrumentalists and singers. The competitors had gone through a selection round of heats before half-term and the finals were the culmination of the competition.
We were also delighted to be using the Steinway Model D concert grand piano for the first time – it had only recently been installed in Big School as part of the piano replacement that had happened the previous week.
There were 3 categories for the pupils, based on their experience, and the standard across the 3 concerts was, once again, very high. We were very grateful to Tim Rhys-Evans MBE – Director of Music at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama – who came to adjudicate and who was very impressed with the quality of the music-making he heard. Congratulations to all those who made it through to the final.
This year, due to COVID restrictions, teams were reduced to 4 firers with the scoring altered to reflect this.
In the C category, Isabel came 1st singing Colours of the Wind by Alan Menken, with Tanush (piano) and Emily (guitar) in 2nd and 3rd respectively.
In the B category, Feiyang was the winner playing Wings of Piano by V.K, with Lincoln (clarinet) and Lochie (saxophone) in 2nd and 3rd places.
The A Category Final (for the most advanced musicians in the College) was a spectacular concert with exceptional performances throughout, and we were delighted to welcome back Mr Malcolm Forbes-Peckham to come and be our guest accompanist – he really is a wonderful pianist. In 3rd place was Shea, playing Density 21.5 by Varèse on the flute, Nalni was in 2nd place playing the third movement of Ravel’s Sonatine for piano. The winner was Josi playing three of the five pieces by Malcolm Arnold on the violin.
In terms of the overall competition, Houses 3 and 8 were joint 3rd, House 6 were 2nd, with the overall winners being Ellerslie House.
Overall it was a fantastic afternoon and evening of music-making and my thanks go to everyone involved – Mr McDade for his running of the whole competition, Malcolm Forbes-Peckham for his outstanding accompanying, Tim Rhys-Evans for a top-class adjudication and his positive, encouraging and insightful comments to every performer. However, our final and most fulsome thanks and congratulations should go to the performers, both in the Finals on Wednesday, but also to all of those who entered the heats back in October. Very well done to everyone.