Some quick snaps from our Open Day 2022!
East Riding Senior Ensembles will be visiting us 20th-24th July, staying at JAAC. They are performing several concerts around Jersey, which will feature East Riding Youth Orchestra, Senior Wind Band, Jazz Collective and Flute Choir. Their concerts will include music to suit all tastes by : Tito Puente, William Walton, Faure, Saint Saens, Bernstein, Lloyd Webber and Adele.
The members of the East Riding Senior ensembles attend schools in the East Riding of Yorkshire. The groups perform in venues in and around the East Riding and beyond. We have undertaken overseas tours to many countries including Italy, Germany, Croatia and Belgium. We are really looking forward to visiting and performing on the beautiful Island of Jersey.
Ackworth School will be staying with us 12th-16th July. They are performing several concerts around Jersey, which will feature a number of their ensembles.
The Ackworth School Senior Choir, led by Oliver McCarthy-Bell, is non-auditioned and consists of students from 11-18 years of age. Priding itself on its diverse range of repertoire, to appeal to a wide-ranging audience, the choir performs music from pop, musical theatre, film, and contemporary classics. With members exceeding 30, the choir consists of about 10% of the full Senior school population! This year, the choir was able to take advantage of the lift in Covid restrictions in the UK with performances at the Rothwell Music Festival, where we won our competition category, and a lunchtime at Wakefield Cathedral, which was enthusiastically received.
The Chamber Choir is a more selective group, made up of some of the older students in the main Senior Choir. Led by Eleanor Younger, the group performs both a capella and accompanied songs, with full 4 part (sometimes more!) harmonies. The choir enjoys performing SATB arrangements of both popular and classical music.
Ackworth String Ensemble is led by Head of Strings, Rae Strong. Comprising of both students and staff, the ensemble both nurtures younger members and allows its older members to demonstrate their skill in playing. The group enjoy playing Although repertoire mainly focuses on classical music and folk, the group have been known to occasionally classical music and folk music, which you can expect to hear in our programme whilst here in Jersey!
We had a wonderful time at our Christmas Event on 11th December.
The Pre-School and Key Stage One children performed their Nativity, aided by our Elves.
We were then able to make some Christmas biscuits and decorations with our Crafty Musician team.
To finish off the afternoon, we had Carols Around the Tree, led by our Vocal Department, which we shared on Zoom with Les Houmets.
A huge thank you to all involved and everyone who came to listen to the Jersey Academy ‘Strings and Friends’ Winter Concert on the 11th.
We enjoyed hearing the Senior String Orchestra in the first half, opening with Sibelius’s Andante Festivo and culminating with Elgar’s lyrical and
expressive Serenade in E minor for Strings, featuring a beautiful violin solo by Anna Edelenbos.
In the second half the strings were joined by other orchestral instruments, performing favourites including Prokoviev’s Troika, Delius’s Winter Night and a rendition of Leroy Anderson’s famous Sleigh Ride.
We were very impressed with the high level of musicianship from all
performers, and look forward to seeing future performances from Jersey Academy Senior Strings!
Many successes in this year’s Eisteddfod
Well done to all of the performers at Eyecan! Vanessa and her violins, accompanied by Cathy on piano and Andy on saxophone and flute.
The audience participation with percussion was a highlight.
We look forward to performing there again next year.
Absolutely blown away by the outstanding performances given by some of our woodwind students for our Saturday concert. Some of our younger students gave extremely confident debut performances, alongside more experienced instrumentalists. Our junior and senior sax ensembles, junior woodwind and three flute ensembles showed that teamwork is alive and well by delivering some very competent programmes. Well done all!
