This half term has heard the sound of choirs and instruments return as we started our year group choir rehearsals and music activities for the upper school.
We have had hardworking and dedicated singers and musicians coming together to produce music for our Christmas service and we have all had to learn new skills as we rehearse in a socially distanced manner.
The year group instrumental concerts have been a big success each Friday, with lots of Holmewoodians admirably keen to share their performances with the community, even though it is via video at the moment. It was lovely to have the year 4 pupils join us as a very small audience last week – the sound of a big round of applause at the end makes all the difference!
Years 3 and 4 have been creating their own percussion orchestras with their classes; year 3 creating a piece called ‘Osiris’, inspired by their history work on Ancient Egypt and year 4 have been exploring the music of the Nutcracker, creating their own performance of Tchaikovsky’s Russian Dance.
Year 5 have been learning to play the ukuleles, tackling chords this half term. We have been performing via video call to our pupils working from home, who have been monitoring our progress each week and holding up a strictly come dancing style score paddle for us which we have tried to improve each time.
We are so glad the instrumental lessons have been able to continue so that our pupils’ musical progress isn’t hampered during this time and our scholars can continue their hard work in preparation for their senior school applications.
Mrs K Squire
