A couple of weeks ago my son performed with the Birmingham Schools Training Brass Band at Symphony Hall in Birmingham. They performed at the Services for Education Youth Proms along with a massed ensemble made up from several schools in the ensemble, a massed choir from a number of Primary Schools in the area, the Birmingham Schools Recorder Ensemble, Birmingham Schools Wind Orchestra, Birmingham Schools Jazz Band, Birmingham Schools Junior String Orchestra, Birmingham Schools Percussion Ensemble and Birmingham Schools Jazz Band.
They played on Thursday 11 July and this was the culmination of a week long festival of wonderful music-making with massed primary school choirs and massed orchestral ensembles performing every night along with some of Birmingham Schools’ 22 ensembles.
Services for Education (SFE) Music Service is the lead organisation for the Birmingham Music Education Partnership. They provide musical instrument tuition to schools in the Birmingham area, and you can also contact them directly to arrange musical instrument tuition. SFE also run, as you may guess from this post, a staggering 22 different musical ensembles from Orchestras, Wind Orchestras and Brass Bands to Guitar Ensembles and Raga and Tala Ensembles. The ensembles rehearse once a week and have at least one performance each term, though it can be more. And all of the ensembles are free to attend the rehearsals. You do have to purchase tickets for performances if you want to attend, and of course the music lessons themselves are not free. But it is brilliant that there are these wonderful, brilliant ensembles children can join once they have reached grade 1 standard on their instrument. For my son I really do see that playing in the Training Brass Band has done wonders for his confidence and for his playing, and even his desire to practice and play. He has absolutely loved it.
This term, the end of the academic year, SFE held a nearly week long festival of music at the prestigious Symphony Hall. Each night a few of the ensembles played along with massed choirs and orchestral ensembles made up from schools from all over Birmingham. As mentioned above, my son performed on Thursday night, the last night of the week. While I didn’t see any of the other nights, at other concerts we have seen performances by different ensembles, so I have no hesitation in saying that what I say below about this concert would apply equally to all the other nights of the week.
In short the concert was brilliant. There were a range of ensembles from the Training Brass Band, which children can audition to join (it was a very simple process of attending a rehearsal and seeing how you got on) once they have reached approximately grade 1 standard on their instrument, to the Wind Orchestra, where children would be approximately grade 5 standard, I think. A huge variety of music was played from Classical pieces by the Junior String Orchestra, to a Queen Medley from the massed choir, to contemporary pieces from the very exciting Percussion Ensemble. The standard of playing was superb. All of the children definitely rose to the challenge set them by their ensemble conductors, and there was even some dancing while playing from the Wind Orchestra. It was a joyous occasion, and I was so impressed.
The evening was a rather long one – we got home after 10.30pm and my 7 year old fell asleep right at the end of the show. I did see that there were a few other small children who were similarly asleep. And many of the audience had left before the end of the show. It would have been lovely if the show had been slightly shorter, but then I don’t know how they would have been able to fit all of the ensembles into the week at Symphony Hall if the show had been shorter. The length of the show was the only niggle I had about it, and I am absolutely nit picking here.
Not only did we really enjoy the show, but my son thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience as well and was on something of a high afterwards. He, and everyone performing in the second half, got to watch the first half from the audience, and then the children performing in the first half swapped with them. It was a very lovely, splendid experience, and so impressive to see the musical talent of our fantastic city showcased in an amazing venue.
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