CYM London Summer Update What a busy summer we've had at CYM London.  A few highlights from the Summer Term Thank you to ex students Amelia Dew & Clarence Ip-Tang who returned to CYM for a recital in April.  We're always delighted to welcome back past students. In May, the Woodwind Department at CYM were lucky enough to have a visit from Christian Forshaw saxophonist and professor of Saxophone at the Guildhall School. Christian worked with three of our older students and was a great inspiration to all! The Masterclass was funded by the very generous Jack Petchey Foundation. Later in the term we were very delighted that Tim Barratt came to work with six CYM students on set pieces in an open masterclass. Teaching forms a major part of Tim's musical life and he works with pupils of all ages and levels from beginner to post-graduate. Having taught at the RAM, TCM and Morley College for many years, Tim is now Head of keyboard at Dulwich College. He frequently directs teachers’ workshops and masterclasses for performers in the UK and Far East and is a busy competition and festival adjudicator.   Early in June, we invited Vera Fonte to give a workshop on memorisation, thanks once again to funding from the Jack Petchey Foundation. Vera is a pianist, music teacher and researcher in the fields of music education and music psychology and holds a bachelor degree in piano performance and a masters in music teaching from the University of Minho (Portugal). In 2014 she joined the Centre for Performance Science at the Royal College of Music (RCM), where she has been working on her PhD. Vera has worked at the RCM as a graduate teaching assistant and regularly performs solo and ensemble pieces in many parts of Europe. Vera premiered contemporary works by composers such as Wynton Guess, Vitorino d’Almeida, Paulo Bastos and Luis Pipa.  On the 30th June we held the final of the annual Louis Watt Competition. The Louis Watt Memorial Fund is the charity set up in 1997 to commemorate Glen Louis Watt, who died in October 1996. He was a teacher in secondary schools in north and east London and headmaster of Tollington Park School, Islington. In retirement, he was a very keen supporter of the LSSO and CYM. He was also chairman of the Friends of the LSSO . The fund helps Louis’ passion for classical music and opera to be transmitted to future generations of school children. It supports the annual competition at CYM and other activities at the Centre too. Our three finalists were: FRANCESCA BIESCAS RUE - FLUTE Francesca is half Spanish and lives in Watford where she is a day pupil at The Purcell School currently   studying for her A-Levels.  She has flute lessons with Anna Pope and Abigail Burrows and also studies voice and jazz. She is in her second year playing with the London Schools Symphony Orchestra conducted by Peter Ash and enjoys performing in orchestras, ensembles and  also solo. DAVEN MITCHINSON - HARP Daven started her musical life at the age of 3 when her parents started to teach her piano and theory. At 7 she was given the opportunity to learn the Harp. By the age of 10, she had successfully achieved Grade 8 with Distinction on the piano and was accepted into the Purcell School in London as a Harpist. A year later saw her performing on stage with Lang Lang at the Royal Festival Hall. Since then Daven has had the opportunity to perform solo on the Harp at Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, and with her Harp Quartet and LSSO Orchestra at the Barbican Centre in London. Daven has also been a keen performer supporting the North Middlesex Hospital in their fundraising charity concerts. She has performed and won at music     festivals including the North London Music Festival. This summer she is looking forward to concerts which include performing at the Southwell Minster and the Royal Festival Hall. MEBRAKH HAUGHTON-JOHNSON - CLARINET Mebrakh is currently a student at the CYM Saturday Centre. After winning his school’s Annual Concerto Competition, Mebrakh had the opportunity to perform the Mozart Clarinet Concerto in A major accompanied by the Kensington Symphony Orchestra (KSO) - with whom he now regularly plays. Mebrakh led the London Youth Wind Band as Principal Clarinettist in 2017. Mebrakh is particularly passionate about mentoring younger children; he was part of a team that volunteered in a school in Cologne, Germany where he tutored infants and adolescents in reggae and ska music. Mebrakh will be studying Saxophone under Kyle Horch and Clarinet under Timothy Lines at the Royal College of Music from September 2018.   Find out more about CYM Over the summer break we had 2 foreign tours and a London based summer course all of which were a huge success! The London Youth Wind Band went to Austria and the London Schools Symphony Orchestra went to Romania! COMING UP... On Monday 17th September 2018 the London Schools Symphony Orchestra will finish the 2018 season with a performance inspired by its recent visit to Transylvania. Serbian pianist Aleksandar Madzar is well known to European audiences, having won prizes in Geneva, Leeds, the 'Busoni' and 'Umberto Micheli' competitions. He is a frequent guest of the Wigmore Hall in London, the Theatre de la Ville in Paris, the Brussels 'Bozar', the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and the Conservatorio in Milan. The LSSO is generously funded by the City of London Corporation and part of the Guildhall Young Artists programme. The recent tour to Transylvania was supported by the Mihai Eminescu Trust (MET), founded by Jessica Douglas-Home, dedicated to the conservation and regeneration of villages and communes in Transylvania and the Maramures, two of the most unspoilt regions of Europe. “In July 2018, 100 music students from the LSSO descended on Malancrav, one of the most magical medieval villages in the heart of Transylvania” comments Jessica Douglas-Home. "Malancrav is one of the many villages where the Trust has been working, and was the perfect place for the musicians from England to join forces with their contemporaries to make music and dance. It was an inspired decision to go there and discover this part of Romania.” Tickets are available from the Barbican Box Office.  In 2020 CYM celebrates half a century To celebrate, we’re launching an appeal, through our sister charity FYM, to raise £500,000 over the next 3 years. We need to raise much needed funds to support talented disadvantaged young people to ensure they don’t miss out on attending The Centre for Young Musicians. We also need to purchase many new instruments and upgrade our old van! If you're CYM Alumni, you can sign up to be part of the celebrations here. "There is no way my parents could have provided by their own means the thorough and inspiring music education I received at CYM... this excellent training built a very strong foundation for my life in music." Djano Bates, jazz musician and CYM alumni To support the work of FYM, the charity that fundraises for bursaries for students to attend CYM, please donate today.

CYM students perform in Mahler 3 at Southwark Cathedral

The Mahler Project was started in 2000 by Keith Willis, and has brought together hundreds of musicians through the music of Mahler. Sadly Keith died of a brain tumour in 2011, since when the concerts have been conducted by Keith's colleague, Daniel Capps, who is continuing the project in his honour, with the proceeds going primarily to Cancer Research UK. 

Some of our CYM students were invited to join in with the famous Bim Bam chorus from the Knabenchor in the 5th movement.

Matthew O'Keefe who is the choir tutor at CYM was the Chorus Master, and Daniel Capps, recently of the New York City Ballet, was the Conductor. The glorious mezzo-soprano soloist was Emma Stannard, recently graduated from the Royal Academy Opera Course. The Mahler Orchestra and Frauenchor were made up of students from the London music colleges, universities and young professionals. 

The next concert with be Mahler's 8th, the Symphony of 1000! Watch this space! 

Morley College and CYM Collaboration!

Morley Chamber Orchestra Beethoven 

piano concerto series

String players from CYM and the LSSO recently helped to enlarge the Morley Chamber Orchestra for a concert including Beethoven’s 1^st piano concerto and pieces by John Woolrich. This was an extremely successful collaboration and the student players received much praise for their high standards of playing and their professional attitude. There are 4 more concerts to follow, each one including a Beethoven piano concerto.

The Morley chamber orchestra will give a series of five concerts in 2017-18, conducted by Charles Peebles. These will include the performance of all Beethoven’s piano concertos with Morley tutors as soloists, as well as ‘new’ works by John Woolrich, Colin Matthews and Paul Sarcich.

Friends of CYM AGM & Concert and a visit from Jeff Warner!

On Saturday 30th September we had a busy lunchtime including the Friends of CYM AGM & Concert and a visit from Jeff Warner!

The Friends of CYM are a huge part of the CYM family they had a great AGM and concert where Christine Bisatt was announced the new FCYM Chair - Congratulations Christine!

Following on from the lunchtime concert we had a visit from Jeff Warner who did a performance followed by a workshop with the CYM Folk Ensembles.

Jeff Warner is among the nation’s foremost performer/interpreters of traditional music. His songs from the lumber camps, fishing villages and mountaintops of America connect 21st-century audiences with the everyday lives – and artistry – of 19th-century Americans. “Providing more than just rich entertainment, Jeff will leave you with a deeper appreciation of the land you live in” (Caffé Lena, Saratoga, NY). His songs, rich in local history and a sense of place, bring us the latest news from the distant past. Jeff Warner sings traditional American and English folk songs. He has performed at festivals and schools throughout America and abroad, and has toured nationally for the Smithsonian Institution. A Folklorist and Community Scholar for the New Hampshire Council on the Arts, he was named a 2007 State Arts Council Fellow. He has recorded for Flying Fish, Appleseed and WildGoose Records.

CYM quartet perform at John Lyon’s Charity Event

John Lyon’s Charity celebrates awarding £100million over 25 years

On 27th September The John Lyon's Charity were delighted to be celebrating awarding £100million in grants to benefit children and young people across their Beneficial Area.

Since the Charity was formed in 1991, over 3,400 grants have been awarded to over 1,500 organisations.  The first grant round in 1991 distributed £198,166 in grants compared to the £10.2million awarded in the last financial year (2016/17).

A quartet formed of two CYM students and two CYM alumni members met once more as the Morley Quartet to entertain guests as they arrived at Westminster Abbey for a celebration of the fund raising successes of the John Lyons Charity.

What a great way to start the new academic year!

Activities day at CYM 2017/18

We started this year at CYM with a visit from Joe Broughton. Joe Broughton is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer and educator based in Birmingham, UK. As well as his own internationally renowned band The Urban Folk Quartet, Joe has played with everyone from Joss Stone to Fairport Convention. His compositions have been performed at The Royal Albert Hall and the Barbican Centre in London and his workshops in performance and ensemble playing are legendary amongst the teaching community.

We were lucky enough to have workshops with Joe all day which gave us a very inspirational start to the year!