Movies and Musicals

3 January 2017

In five years at Stowe this was probably the best quality and most uplifting concert that I have experienced with Stoic musicians. This was a concert of great variety, starting with two movements from the St Paul’s Suite by the String Orchestra directed by Chris Windass. They were joined by Charlotte Brennan (Lower Sixth, West) on the harp and by our flute teacher Sally Adams, for Vaughan Williams’ haunting ‘Fantasia on Greensleeves’. This was very cleverly programmed to follow the same tune in Holst’s arrangement in the St Paul’s Suite. Charlotte then went on to play a wonderful solo on the harp, demonstrating her amazing musicianship and technical skill. We were then treated to two Stoic String Quartets, playing very mature interpretations of movements by Beethoven and Borodin. The first half concluded with the opening movement of Grieg’s Holberg Suite, again showing off our very fine String Orchestra.

After a short interval to rearrange the stage, the Wind Band got off to a great start with the ‘Captain America March’. The Clarinet Quartet, directed by our clarinet teacher Jonathan Howse, then gave a great rendition of a ‘Slavonic Dance’ by Dvorak. The Wind Band continued with their ‘Movies and Musicals’ theme, with music from ‘Les Misérables’ and ‘Gladiator’. ‘The World is not Enough’ had its opening sequence filmed at Stowe, featuring Steve Duffy our Bagpipe teacher, so we recreated this with Steve playing the pipes at the end of the theme tune. Steve then led our Pipe and Drum Trio featuring Josh (Fourth Form, Temple) and Adam (Third Form, Temple) McKelvey and Jamie Baillie (Fifth Form, Cobham). They then joined the Wind Band for a performance of ‘Highland Cathedral’. The concert concluded with music from ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’.

Photos from the event can be seen here.

Nigel Gibbon, Head of Brass, Wind and Percussion