Spotlight on young musicians
Stirling Council’s instrumental music service showcased a wealth of talent at the weekend.
Pupils from schools across the Stirling area performed at the Albert Halls in Stirling on Friday and at McLaren High School in Callander on Saturday.
Around 200 pupils took part in two days of rehearsals followed by the two concerts.
The Albert Halls concert started with a solo by Tomoki Hayashi, an S6 pupil at Wallace High School.
This was followed by the combined senior and junior bands of Stirling and District Pipe Band then the choir with four very varied pieces.
James Whyte and Rhianna Faunce-Smith from Dunblane High School were featured in the popular ‘Million Dreams’ from ‘The Greatest Showman’.
The wind band was the largest group of the evening with 73 pupils in it. Their programme included a new piece called ‘Cataclysm’ and finished with an arrangement of Carly Rae Jepsen’s ‘Call Me Maybe’.
Fraser Lindsay, a pupil at Balfron High School, performed a jazz solo on double bass. Fraser also played in the youth orchestra and string orchestra, as well as putting in a bass line for the choir. He also plays drums.
The youth orchestra’s first performance in the concert was ‘Morning’ and ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ from Greig’s ‘Peer Gynt Suite.’
These were followed by an arrangement by Tom Smith, the youth orchestra conductor, of the WW1 song ‘Over There’ by George Cohan.
The string orchestra performed a varied programme including ‘Eine Kleine Nacht Musik’ and Adele’s ‘Rollin’ in the Deep’.
The guitar ensemble played the Scottish air ‘The Lass o’ Patie’s Mill’ , followed by ‘In the Mood’ by Glenn Miller.
The orchestra finished the evening with an energetic performance of the final movement of Dvorak’s ‘New World Symphony’ and some snippets of Harry Potter music as an encore.
The same programme was performed on Saturday at McLaren High School, with the combined Balfron and McLaren pipe bands getting the evening off to a rousing start
The council’s senior music tutor Lesley McEwan said: “Both evenings were thoroughly enjoyable with music for every taste.
“The instrumental tuition team was delighted with all the performances and with the huge audiences.
“The pupils are a delight to work with. We could not have asked for more cooperation and it is lovely to see friendships develop across the schools.”