News

The inventor of the Vuvuzela has a lot to answer for. The Vuvuzela (for those of you have chosen to focus your attention away from our disgraceful football team in South Africa and onto the far more enthralling entertainment taking place down in SW19 on centre court) is plastic, a metre long and sounds like an elephant. It is an instrument, but not always a musical one and produces a loud, monotone sound usually around Bflat. For many of our students at Music First, however, it has, over the past few weeks become the instrument of choice. 'Forget the trumpet' they say, 'and give me a Vuvuzela!' I for one, am reluctant to discourage them - apparently it is fantastic for developing embouchure.

World cup disasters aside, here at Music First it is full steam ahead as we come to the end of the academic year. Spurred on by the fantastic news that Highbury Grove School received an Outstanding in its Ofsted Inspection, the teachers and students have approached the last few weeks with renewed energy and vigour.

Our main focus currently is ensuring that all our students achieve their end of year target on their instrument - whether it be a music medal level or grade exam. Highbury Grove, for the first time ever, has been assigned a visiting examiner from the Associated Board given the high numbers of students taking grades this year. We also have an accompanist from the Royal College of Music rehearsing with the students in preparation for their performances.

There have been a number of exciting trips and visits over the past few weeks. A gifted and talented group of Music First students were taken to hear the Meta4 String Quartet perform a programme of Shostakovich, Schumann and Salles as part of the City of London Music Festival. Despite the challenging repertoire, the students rose to the occasion brilliantly and asked a series of insightful and well informed questions about the music. On the 28th June, we also took our star studded Turkish Music Ensemble to perform at the Opening Ceremony for Teach First where, as ever, the virtuosic skill of Memet Sucu on his Saz wowed the entire audience.

The primary Music First students too are all set to deliver some stunning performances over the next couple of weeks. On Tuesday 6th July, the choir at Highbury Quadrant will be joining forces with other local Primary Schools to perform as part of the Pure Voices concert at the Union Chapel. By popular demand, the choir will also be re-forming for a performance as part of the Highbury Quadrant Cultural Week on Thursday 15th July. On the same day, the choir will be competing for 'air time' as the hard working students at the Primary Hub will be be showcasing their work so far to family and friends here at Highbury Grove. With items on the programme such as 'So Far Jazz' and 'Shark Attack', it looks set to be an extremely eclectic performance!


The new Music First partnership with the internationally renowned Royal Academy of Music will be launched on July 13th at a special workshop performing improvising and composing day at the RAM for 30 of our primary age children. Also taking part will be children from Lewisham Academy and Kuumba Youth Music. Future plans include concerts to be presented by Music First at the Royal Academy and a mentoring scheme between our students and Academy students from both Junior and Senior departments. We are very excited about all the fantastic opportunities this new partnership will bring. We are indebted to Krystyna Budzynska from the Junior Academy for all her hard work in helping us to make it all a reality.

Finally, not a group of people to shy away from competition (unlike our efforts in South Africa - yes, we're still bitter) the Music First students are preparing for an inter-house music competition. Representatives from each of the four Highbury Grove houses - Ignis, Terra, Ventus and Aqua - will be competing for a coveted spot in the House Music Competition Final on Wednesday 14th. So, as preparations 'kick-off' for what will undoubtedly be a closely fought battle, I'm off to confirm our all star judging panel and find myself a Vevuzela.

P.S. As we move from monthly to half termly releases of the newsletter, expect the next issue in October. To all our supporters, thank you and have a wonderful summer!

STOP PRESS
Congratulations to Nathan Theodoulou on his appointment as Creative Projects Director for Music First from September 2010.