A year of music
HERE at Macquarie Conservatorium, 2016 has been humming with inspiring music-making of all sorts and sizes and sounds! Just some of the highlights are rounded up in our monthly stock-take below.
January
A fun holiday activity for kids made sure we got the year of to a noisy but musical start. Drumming workshops with drum-meister Dale Freeman proved a hit with eight to twelve year olds who worked off any holiday boredom with gusto, filling two packed sessions at the Conservatorium and another at Apollo House. Meanwhile our admin staff enrolled new and continuing students and started to juggle teachers, rooms and the students’ competing after-school activities in search of the perfect lesson timetable.
February
Two local schools upped the musical ante this year. Dubbo Public School hit a new high with more than 80 students busy learning an instrument, wind, brass or guitar, from their Conservatorium teachers. Meanwhile, Orana Heights Public School introduced three brand new music programs reaching more than 150 students: specialist classroom music for kindy to year 2; ukulele for a whole class of year 4, and wind and brass tuition for students from years 5 and 6. Great to see all those colourful ukuleles in young hands!
March
March was Moorambilla month across the region, and the indefatigable Michelle Leonard kicked off her three week workshop tour of western NSW regional towns right here in Dubbo, visiting schools and giving two workshops at the Conservatorium. Local youth were keen to take part and have the chance to sing in the next Moorambilla Festival in September.
April
At the end of Term 1, five students at Macquarie Conservatorium received the results of their audition for the newly formed Regional Youth Orchestra NSW (RYO NSW). Selected from talented students across the NSW Regional Conservatorium network, violinist India de Sousa Shaw, violist Emma Newby, French horn player Aidan Kiriakou, tuba player Robin Hall and percussionist Sam Minney will take part in exciting RYO NSW projects at the Sydney Opera House, plus play in a major event in October for Regional Arts Australia’s Artlands Festival in Dubbo…..the planning begins now.
May
May was concert month at the Conservatorium. Talented tertiary students on tour from Sydney Conservatorium gave a public concert and visited three schools, bringing their classical and jazz music to hundreds of school children. The Streeton Trio gave the third concert in the visiting artist series, and their generous and inspiring masterclass for string and piano students was a great hit with our young players. Students from the Conservatorium advanced chamber music program delighted a Mother's Day crowd with their performance at the annual high tea event at Dundullimal Homestead.
June
Conservatorium students were busy playing solos, duets, and ensembles in the City of Dubbo Eisteddfod. Notable among the many prize-winners was pianist Madelyn Fardell, awarded the Instrumental Scholarship, judged across all the competitors playing wind, brass, strings, guitar and piano.
This month also saw the start of some very hard work by a talented bunch of young singers, who formed a youth chorus to perform with Opera Australia at Dubbo Regional Theatre later in the year. They began 8 weeks of intensive rehearsals to get ready to perform in a professional opera production.
July
Talented young singer and Conservatorium student Billy Palin was awarded a NSW Young Regional Artist Scholarship, enabling her to travel to London in July for a period of intensive workshops in voice, acting and movement with leading music theatre professionals in the West End.
The first Regional Youth Orchestra project for the year saw four Conservatorium students join others from across the state at the Sydney Opera House to experience the life of a professional orchestral musician. Working with mentors from the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, our young musicians played in the cramped pit of the Opera Theatre and were thrilled to accompany an Opera Australia singer in an aria from Bizet’s Carmen.
August
It’s AMEB exam time – the nationwide music exam system our students follow. Specialist examiners travelled to regional centres like our Conservatorium to assess performance and technical skills of music students from Dubbo and neighbouring towns.
In beautifully made period costumes, the 22 young singers in the Macquarie Youth Chorus performed their well-rehearsed parts alongside the professional singers from Opera Australia in Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro, an amazing opportunity for country kids to be part of a first class opera production in front of their home crowd at the Dubbo Regional Theatre.
Four outstanding jazz musicians visited this month: Dubbo’s own renowned bass player Phil Stack and his friends vocalist Emma Pask, guitarist James Muller and drummer Tim Firth. As well as performing a sensational sell-out concert, these musicians gave an inspiring jazz workshop to Dubbo secondary students.
September
Open Day was a little more packed than usual, with rain moving the Band Extravaganza indoors for the first time in 5 years. The wet weather didn’t dampen the enthusiasm for the drumming workshops available that day with visiting artist Kai Tipping. Kai also visited 3 primary schools and gave workshop for teens and adults, laying the groundwork for a massed drumming performance for the Artlands Festival in October.
Students Emma Newby and Billie Palin with staff member Nadine Isbester were selected to perform in a concert at NSW Parliament House hosted by the Minister for Education Adrian Piccoli, showcasing the most talented performers from across the NSW Regional Conservatorium network.
India de Sousa Shaw, Emma Newby, Aidan Kiriakou, and Sam Minney were the Conservatorium representatives in the RYO NSW project with the Australian World Orchestra (AWO). 45 students from the 17 NSW Regional Conservatoriums were tutored by some of Australia’s best musicians and performed with them in the AWO’S concert at the Sydney Opera House. Tuba player Robin Hall wasn’t able to do this project because he was touring Europe with the NSW Department of Education’s West of the Divide Band!
October
This month was all about drumming, orchestras and…. artlands! Together with Outback Arts, 20 drums and drum teacher Dale Freeman went on tour to Cobar, Bourke, Warren, Coonamble, Walgett and Lightning Ridge for community workshops. Next for Dale and his Conservatorium Drum Ensemble was their annual gig playing in the DREAM Festival Lantern Parade. Then Kai Tipping returned and drummed up an impressive performance from more than 70 of our local youth and adult drummers for the opening event of the Artlands Festival.
The Conservatorium hosted the full Regional Youth Orchestra NSW in Dubbo for a three-day residential camp, rehearsing for their performance in the Artlands Festival. Bad weather moved the planned outdoor finale concert inside to the Dubbo Regional Theatre, but the talented young musicians impressed with a rousing program of music that ranged from Mendelssohn to Sculthorpe, and from West Side Story to Lord of the Rings.
November
Teachers in the Conservatorium school music program visited more than 15 schools across Dubbo, Wellington, Narromine, Gilgandra and Trangie on their annual “Puff Blow and Bow” tour, introducing school children to the wind, brass and string instruments we teach, and giving students who’d like to start learning music next year the chance to try an instrument in handson workshops.
The Youth Music Theatre students performed their second show of the year; after exploring a science fiction theme with their first show in August, their November show, “Straw and Order” was the traditional Christmas story with a twist, scoring a hit with the young audiences who came along to two special shows for schools and pre-schools.
December
School bands were on high rotation this month, playing at end of year concerts, fetes, graduation and assemblies, with our teachers racing across town to conduct “just one more performance”.
The Conservatorium own end of year concert showcased the growth in our own ensembles, for wind, strings, brass, guitar, drums, all of them dedicated to the enjoyment of making music together. Conservatorium students and staff will keep playing in the coming weeks at Christmas Carol events around town and beyond, but here at the Conservatorium it’s unusually quiet in the teaching rooms and concert hall, just for now.
What’s On
December 16: Conservatorium office closes at 5pm for summer break
January 9: Conservatorium office reopens at 9am after summer break
January 18 and 19: Holiday Drumming Workshops for kids 8-12 years
January 31 and 21: Free Come and Try session Musicmakers for children 5-6 years February 1 and 2: Free Come and Try sessions Musicplay for children 2-3 years and 4-5 years
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