MUSIC NEWS
AMEB EXAMS
Congratulations to the students who took part in the AMEB exams over the last few weeks. Results coming in so far are outstanding and all students and teachers should be very proud of their efforts.
GIGS ON THE GREEN
Congratulations to all the students who took part in the final Gigs on the Green for 2019. This was an Open Mic day and the students who took part were outstanding. Ido Shahar, Eden Rembach, Anita Su, Janae Hunter, Ruben Stein-Fooks, Anudi Adikari, Jonathan Pardo, Lachlan Edis and Leevi Stein were all outstanding performers. Thank you to the amazing committee who organised this ongoing concert series and to Mr Kurowski for his leadership and development of the program.
ART SHOW
Congratulations to Emily Nguyen, who was an outstanding performer at the annual Art Show on Thursday 7 November. She provided a fantastic soundtrack to the opening of the show and received many positive comments about her performance.
CLAREMONT TERRACE
Congratulations to the Year 8 and 9 Singing students who performed to a highly appreciative audience at Claremont Terrace on Thursday 7 November. The students were an outstanding representation of the school community. Thank you to Ms West for organising this group of students to perform.
REMEMBRANCE DAY CEREMONY
Thank you to the students who represented the school at the Remembrance Day Ceremony on Monday 11 November at the Bentleigh RSL. The saxophone quartet (Lewis Barclay, Sonya Mikhaylova, Adam Pacak and Daniel Rumanovsky) accompanied the singers (Grace James and James Vassiliou). Thank you to Mr West for organising this group of musicians for this occasion.
DATES FOR TERM 4
Junior Concert – Thursday 5 December
Presentation Night – Tuesday 17 December
Megan Papworth
Head of Music
CLAREMONT TERRACE EXCURSION - VOICE
On Thursday 7 November, thirteen VOICE students from Years 8 and 9 braved the pouring rain and trekked to Claremont Terrace, the Aged Care facility. After struggling with the automatic door for too long a time, we were invited into a large, plush room to set up for our performances. One broken microphone stand later and a few technical hitches, we were ready to begin. Valeria Camacho Acevedo filmed the show on her phone and provided emotional support.
The first performance was from Persephone Gardiner and Lisa (Xiaotong) Liu. Their chosen song was White Christmas sung by Bing Crosby. They wore seasonal hats and the audience watched with eager anticipation.
The next performance was A Whole New World from the Aladdin soundtrack. This was sung wonderfully by Ruby Powell and Dize Yesildag, who also played the accompaniment without error on the piano. The eyes of the elderly shone with gratitude for the beautiful music.
After that, Francesca Wood and Seffra Tienstra sang Someone You Loved by Lewis Capaldi. Francesca beamed while Seffra hit the high notes and their musical chemistry amazed the viewers.
Varun Tangri sang Don’t Dream, It’s Over by Crowded House with all of his very being. His masculine voice provided a sharp yet incredible contrast to the rest of the singers, which many retirees were very happy to hear.
Next came Holly Langley and Emilia Mason who sang Favourite Things from The Sound Of Music. The spectators were well and truly wowed with their singing, some humming along with the nostalgia coursing through their veins.
Rose McCallum, Emily Andjelic and Jenny (Zilai) Huang then performed Edelweiss, again a song from The Sound Of Music. The crowd were captured by their harmonies and several had begun to hum the tune after the first verse.
The grand finale was performed by Holly, Emilia, Rose, Emily and Jenny. Complementing their theme of The Sound Of Music tracks, they performed So Long, Farewell. The introductory ‘Cuckoo!’ verse was met with much delight.
To end the singing portion of the day, the whole group gathered together and sang White Christmas and So Long, Farewell as encores. The retirees joined in and one lady was even moved to tears after the final verse of the latter.
With only a few minutes until we had to leave, we were encouraged to talk to the aged residents. We sat down and listened to interesting stories about their lives and all left a little bit wiser than when we’d come. One man, who had been a soprano in his church choir, made us laugh with a few jokes about his life in care. They showered us with gratitude and we were very touched and a bit sad to leave.
A big thank you to Ms West and Ms Papworth for organising and taking us on this fantastic excursion. We enjoyed every minute of it.
Persephone Gardner
Year 9 Student