Reflections of Term 2 and what we can look forward to this semester 

Dear Parents and Students

Hope you are having a wonderful term break and that the break is giving you a chance to re-charge, pursue your interests and experience new activities as well as sights and sounds. I am looking forward to meeting, learning and exploring new insights into music education and attending a piano recital series when I attend the Australia Piano Pedagogy Conference this week. As the late Steve Jobs once said "Learn continually - there's always "one more thing" to learn!  

I hope you have a little more time at hand to practise and explore new sounds on your music instrument too. I call this "noodling" and I have been doing that quite a fair bit lately each morning on the keys by simply making up my own tunes with my right hand based on a set of chord progressions and a set of scale or simply change up /improvise the tune as I go along.

We should encourage creativity and recognise that we don't  play music with merely our fingers/hands but with our whole body, mind, imagination and feelings.  We should always give ourselves the freedom to explore and express our authentic and possibly quirky selves through the resonant sounds of the music instrument.  It can be quite therapeutic and fun!

Term 3 will be a 10 week term for all lessons.  Lessons commence on Monday 15 July and will end on Sunday 22 September.

We are looking forward to hosting the next Forte Lounge (mini recital) on Sunday 4 August with students sitting the AMEB exams in mid-August.  

The Forte Lounge event is a perfect opportunity for our more advanced students (for piano - Creative Keys 2 and above) to share their love of music by performing a solo or a duet or take part in an ensemble piece to a small audience in an informal and cozy setting. I encourage students sitting the AMEB exams in August to participate as a rehearsal for the music exam. Do have a chat with your child's teacher on this.  Spots are limited to 12 performers.  If you would like to register your child for the Forte Lounge mini recital on 4 August, please do so no later than 21 July.

Here are some highlights from the last Forte Lounge recital on 23 June.

Here is Oliver with a toe tapping jazzy piece called "The Banjo" by Schoenmehl.

Saxon also gave a convincing performance of "the Singing Sioux" by W Gillock.

I also joined in the fun by performing a duet piece with Ms Jacinta called Centerpoint by Pam Wedgwood

We hope that our students will continue to grow and find joy in making music! Here is to a more musical semester ahead!

Semester One AMEB results

 Well done to the following students for achieving the following results:- 

Ashmit Pharande - Honours in Piano (Grade 2)

Jaidyn Chin - Honours in Piano (Grade 2)

Akshadha Manikandan - Credit (Grade 4)

NIlaarni Elankathir - Credit in Guitar (Grade 3)

Aidan O' Shaughnessy - Credit  in Piano (Grade 4)

In Music theory , many congrats to the following students:-

Kaitlyn Chua (Grade 2) - High Distinction

Jayden Chooi (Grade 1) - High Distinction

Tanya Jayawardena (Grade 1) - High Distinction

Sitting music exams are a good benchmark of progress and  is one way of motivating students to keep up with their practice. However , we need to bear in mind exams are not the only tool to measure success in musicianship skills  or the most important reason why students learn music.