Making Music
Music 2019
Each year as I sit to write this article, I am blown away by the amount of success that we continue to achieve with our Music students. The sheer number and quality of the Concerts and performances and the number of students that are involved each year….just WOW! Thanks to the Music students at Kurunjang Secondary College, I believe that we are the best Music program in Melton!
Last year I welcomed Dan Muscat, this year, I thank him for his awesome effort and enthusiasm. I am thrilled that next year, for the first time since 2007, we will have two full time Music teachers working at Kurunjang Secondary College again. The Music Department has grown so much, that we need the extra teacher full time.
This year was our first year offering VET Music Industry - Certificate III Performance. The group that have undertaken this study have been met with many challenges, it is a huge workload, but the reward will be a Nationally recognised certificate at the end of 2020. We will also welcome a new VET group undertaking Year 1 of the Certificate next year.
We say goodbye to the Music Class of 2019; Zac Fisicchia (Guitar) and Shauna Grammatikos (Vocals). It was a small but fun group this year. We wish them all the best with their results and their future endeavors with Music. On behalf of our Year 12 Music students, I would like to thank the very talented Mr Mark Zerafa, who played Drums for the band and Mr Joe Costa who assisted with rehearsals. I would also like to thank Thomas Bakes (Bass Guitar) and Vincenzo Zurzolo (Keyboard) for their assistance and the countless hours that they have given to the Year 12 Music students in rehearsal and performance time.
2019 had the Music Department very busy! We have continued to celebrate the phenomenon that is music with an unprecedented amount of student performances, which included two Instrumental Music Concerts, two Rock Band Performance Nights, The College Awards Ceremony and ‘Music Count Us In’ at Wedge Park Primary and many other performances that have allowed our students to continue to demonstrate their amazing talents to the College and wider Melton Community. At the time of writing this article, we performed a major Rock Band Concert last night – 14th November. 23 items were on the program and approximately 500 people attended the concert. That was just amazing!
This is the fourth year that we have been associated with Music Count Us In, which is an Australia Wide Music performance initiative where participating schools perform the set song (We Are – 2019) at the same time and day right across Australia and New Zealand – 12.30pm AEDT on Thursday November 7th. This year over 3,500 schools participated, including more than one million students in Australia and New Zealand! What a powerful message Music sends! It was a pleasure to work with Jenny Velja (Music Teacher at Wedge Park Primary School) and Erin Thomas (Choir Teacher at Wedge Park Primary School) and to prepare a combination of our year 9, 10 and 11 music students who provided a live rock band for the whole Wedge Park Primary community to sing along to ‘We Are’. Our students also played three other songs on the day; Treasure, Sucker and Choir. It was something else to see almost 1200 Primary School students and staff on their feet singing and dancing to music that we have made for them.
I would especially like to acknowledge the amazing contributions and support of the Music Team – Daniel Muscat, Mark Zerafa, Joe Costa, Earl Leonard, Hugh McKelvey, Samantha Smith and Fiona Morris. They do an amazing job on a daily and weekly basis to help our kids achieve great results as Musicians and to be able to perform at the highest level.
In conclusion, I would like to acknowledge my amazing students who work so hard and try each and every Music rehearsal to improve on their personal skills. My team of awesome Music staff and Troy Roughly – who helps us with all the little things!
I wish everyone a safe and Merry Christmas and look forward to so much more awesome Music in 2020!
Mrs. Joanne Zerafa
Director of Music
