“OUTSTANDING”, “fantastic”, “spine-tingling”, “marvellous” – these are just some of the adjectives that have been used around school today to describe last night’s (March 10th’s) Senior Vocal Festival Finalists’ Concert!
The festival – like our Senior Instrumentalist Festival held earlier this term – is a firm favourite on the King’s Ely music events calendar, and it was wonderful to be able to welcome an audience for the first time since the pandemic started.
Vocalists in Years 9-13 battled it out in a series of heats, held between February 24th and March 1st. The competition was fierce, with so many students deserving a place to perform in Ely Cathedral.
But it was Eleanor Kittoe, Hugh Chippington, Ivana Peat, Kit Attwater, Thomas Apostolou, Caroline Fisher, Jodi Newell and Cordelia Udy (ensemble), Charlotte Senior, Isa Holland, Thomas Bateman, Alexandra Bowerman, (Thomas and Alexandra also qualified as an ensemble), Ben Kittoe, Thomas Allen, Jessica Harding, and Annie Moore who made it through to the Finalists’ Concert.
The concert took place in the intimate South Transept of the Cathedral and we were delighted to welcome renowned Choral and Orchestral Conductor, Manvinder Rattan, as our adjudicator for the evening.
Every student sang to an impeccable standard, singing everything from Schubert to Jule Styne, and members of our close harmony girls’ group, The Nightingales, concluded the performances with a lovely version of ABBA’s ‘The Name of the Game’.
After much deliberation, Mr Rattan announced the following:
Winner of Intermediate Classical Class: Ivana Peat
Winner of Intermediate Popular Class: Hugh Chippington
Winner of Senior Classical Class: Alexandra Bowerman
Winner of Senior Popular Class: Jessica Harding
Winner of German Lieder Class: Kit Attwater
Winner of Self-Accompanied Class: Ben Kittoe
Winner of the Darren Jeffery Cup for Intermediate Singer of the Year: Ivana Peat
Winner of the James Bowman Cup for Senior Singer of the Year: Alexandra Bowerman
Congratulations not just to our winners, but to every single student who had the courage to take part in the festival. Thank you to everyone involved in making the annual programme such a success – our Head of Vocal Studies, Peter North; our Vocal Tutors; our Music Department; our Accompanists; the Catering Team; Custodians; James Lane for tech support; and the Dean and Chapter of Ely Cathedral!