African drumming
Arts Week began on Monday 6 March with the uplifting sound of African Drums permeating the school as students from KS3 and KS4 took part in workshops and learnt about West African culture. Students then gave an lively performance in Assembly, which was truly captivating.
Puppet workshop
On Tuesday, Mark Goldthorp, a West End actor, writer and puppet master taught some of the students how to use and perform with Muppet puppets. This culminated in a performance in Assembly by Year 10 and 11 students of The Muppet Show theme, which was rehearsed in very quick time, and was so liked, they had to perform it twice! Mark Goldthorp also answered questions on his puppets and his acting career and was genuinely surprised at the level and standard of the questions he was asked.
House Arts Festival
The annual House Arts Festival took place on Wednesday and students from all years performed in front of a very supportive audience and Mark Randle, actor, singer and adjudicator for the day. Everyone was struck by how confident the students were and by their wide range of talents, from classical piano to contemporary popular music. Alongside the more experienced students who had performed at previous events, we also had younger students making their debut. It was truly inspiring to see how many younger students were prepared to get up on stage.
The standout performances were Ms Holliss’ Year 11 form with their own enthusiastic performance of Don’t Look Back in Anger by Oasis, which was greatly appreciated by the whole school, and also the modernised Drama performance of Faust.
Although a celebration of talents, the House Arts Festival is also a competition and this year’s winner is Genevieve! Congratulations to them and to the acts chosen to perform at the Performing Arts Gala on 28 March.
Thank you to all our wonderful performers, to Mr Herriman and Ms Philips for overseeing the performances, and to the Year 9 technical team who made the acts look so good.
This was truly our school at its best!