Senior School 

Performing Arts

Musica Viva - Aura Go and Tomoe Kawabata Residency

Whilst Musica Viva artists Aura Go and Tomoe Kawabata are unable to continue with their planned residency at Orange Regional Conservatorium because of restrictions around COVID-19, our elective and senior Music students still have the opportunity to connect with them. Aura and Tomoe will be conducting remote piano lessons and masterclasses for advanced students. They will also be video conferencing with elective and senior music classes about a range of topics including contemporary Australian Music, repertoire, preparing for performances and practising effectively.

Should you wish your child to have a piano lesson with Aura or Tomoe, please contact Mrs Shields at jshields@kws.nsw.edu.au

Virtual Eisteddfod success – Toby Gough

Not to be deterred by constraints provided by the COVID-19 pandemic, Toby Gough recently participated in two Australia wide virtual eisteddfodau, taking out several awards. It’s wonderful that our performing artists can still find performance opportunities, even though performing to a camera is a very different experience to ‘live’ performing. 

Here’s a summary of Toby’s awards:

Encore Speech and Drama Virtual Eisteddfod

• 13 years and Over Best Performer

Theatre Arts Titles

• 14 and Under Drama – Best Monologue
• 14 and Under Drama – Best Poem
• 14 and Under Drama – Best Speech
• 14 and Under Best Music Piece
• Overall Adjudicator's Choice – Music

Year 12 Drama – Verbatim Theatre

Last week Year 12 Drama students performed their original devised Verbatim Theatre performance which was created collaboratively online while learning remotely.

Verbatim theatre is a form of documentary theatre which is based on the spoken words of real people. In its strictest form, verbatim theatre-makers use real people’s words exclusively, and take this testimony from recorded interviews (Pure Verbatim). However, the form is more malleable than this, and writers have frequently combined interview material with invented scenes or used reported and remembered speech rather than recorded testimony. There is an overlap between verbatim theatre and documentary theatre. This style is referred to as ‘Massaged Verbatim’ and aims to capture the spirit of the people interviewed through the dialogue.

The performance was to be based on the topic: “I love a sunburnt country…of drought and flooding rains- A story of human resilience and community spirit.” Using this theme, their final massaged Verbatim performance explored the impact that drought, flood and fire has had on Australia by combining multiple testimonies, news articles, video footage, poetry, physical theatre, movement and staging and lighting effects.  

It was excellent to see their planning, script and idea come to light on the stage, and is a testament to their hard work over the remote learning period. 

Miss Dunkley, Year 12 Drama teacher

Students returning 

Whilst remote learning has been an adventure that we’ve all learnt a lot from, it’s been so lovely to be back in the classroom with our socially distanced senior classes.  Here are Mrs McRae’s Year 7 Music, Miss Dunkley’s Year 11 Drama class and Mrs Shields’ Year 11 Music 2 classes.  It’s so nice to be able to bounce ideas off each other and learn together again. 

Upgrade to Instrumental Rooms

Our amazing facilities team have made the most of a quiet workplace whilst staff and students have been working off-site. They have revamped our external practice rooms ready for when instrumental lessons can begin again.  We are very much looking forward to being able to use these improved spaces. Thank you to Luke Simkins and his team.

Music and Learning

Australian researcher Dr Anita Collins has been doing research on the effect of learning an instrument on brain development. 

Here is a link to a short TEDed video explaining some of her findings: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0JKCYZ8hng

Mrs Jacqueline Shields 

Head of Performing Arts