If You Can't Beat Them...

Although we were lacking success on the sports field during last week our cultural dimension came to the fore later in the week. We tried a new approach and joined forces with NPBHS to gain considerable success in the Big Sing choral event on Thursday night, the Chamber Music competitions on Friday night and the Rockquest on Saturday night. Our next couple of posts will celebrate a few of these great results.

First up is a report from Jane Connolly on the Chamber Music event.

We had four students entered in a combined BHS and FDMC group on Friday night at the Chamber Music Contest. This group named 'Gladys and the Pips' (Gladys being Josh Connolly's cello) played David Hamilton's Miniature Concerto: Going for Baroque, Lullaby and Hoedown. David Hamilton had arranged the score specifically for their instrumentation and it was very beneficial for this group to be able to workshop with David Hamilton on this piece. It was fantastic when they gained first placing and also won the prize for playing a New Zealand composition.

The group members were;
Andrew Hockey (violin), Josh Connolly (cello), Bing Bing Wong (viola), Dominic Jacquemard (Clarinet) from FDMC and from NPBHS Thomas Lawley (flute), Satyam Patel (flute) and James Buckland (piano).

Pictured;- Gladys and the Pips celebrating their win with New Plymouth MP Jonathan Young. L-R- Dominic, Andrew, Bing BIng, James, Jonathan Young, Thomas, Satyam and Josh.