Scholarly Musical Entertainment

This last week has seen a number of strong musical performances from our Music Scholars, pupils and staff.

A number of our Music Scholars gave a varied, skilful, and highly entertaining recital on Saturday afternoon, in aid of the John Pounds Charitable Trust. Year groups 8 to 13 were represented, performing styles from Baroque to contemporary. These expressive performances were given on the recorder, clarinet, viola, trumpet, piano and voice and were extremely well received. The ticket sales raised over £300 for this deserving cause. Thank you, as ever, to Miss Kingsley for her fabulous piano accompaniment!

On 25 January Students’ Collective took part in the Pro Corda National Chamber Music Competition heats. The regional heats were held at St Catherine’s School in Bramley, and the band were the first group to perform in the 2024 competition, and the first jazz ensemble to enter the competition. The band played Whiplash, Funky Cha-Cha, and Caravan in a high-octane performance. The feedback from adjudicator, Andrew Quatermaine, was excellent; “a truly stunning mini-concert … simply thrilling - I loved it!.”  We find out in two weeks whether the group are through to the Semi-Finals! Watch their performance by clicking above.

Old Portmuthian World Premiere at Portsmouth Cathedral Lunchtime Live!
The Cathedral’s Lunchtime Live! Concert programme this week was a beautiful piano recital given by our very own Head of Keyboard Studies, Karen Kingsley. The programme was a wonderful celebration of English twentieth and twenty first century composers featuring works by Lennox Berkely and Parry and included a brand-new work written especially for Miss Kingsley by Old Portmuthian, Benedict Blythe. His atmospheric piece, The Abbey, explored the resonance of large-scale spaces and mirrored the architecture of Romsey Abbey. It was lovely to see Benedict, who left PGS in 2022, in the audience. He is currently studying composition at the Royal Academy of Music.