he Easter holidays started in style when, as part of our 175th anniversary celebrations, we hosted the Friends Schools Joint Choir Festival 2017 at St Mary’s Church in Banbury. Pupils from our sister Quaker schools ... Ackworth School near Pontefract, Walden School in Saffron Walden and Friends’ School in Lisburn ... travelled to Oxfordshire especially for the festival.


Quaker schools in harmony T


The highlight, however, was the performance of Fauré’s Requiem, featuring a combined choir of more than 100 voices, with Sibford pupils Isobel (Year 7) taking the soprano solo and Matthew (Year 13) the baritone solo.


Each choir performed their own individual pieces. Ackworth treated us to ‘The Gift To Be Simple’ (arr. by Bob Chilcott) and ‘Let the Earth Resound’ by Sally Albrecht. Friends’ School Lisburn performed ‘Codhlaim go suan id Chroí’ by Michael McGlynn. Walden School performed the popular ‘One Day More’ from Les Misérables, and our own choir performed John Rutter’s ‘The Lord Bless You And Keep You’ and Mozart’s ‘Ave Verum’.


Fiona Hudson, Head of Music at Sibford School said: “We were delighted to host the Friends Schools Joint Choir Festival and to welcome friends from our sister Quaker schools. It was a fabulous evening and all the choirs performed brilliantly.”


Explaining why she chose Fauré’s Requiem as the festival pièce de résistance, Fiona said: “Fauré’s Requiem contains the most beautiful melodies and harmonies. The final movement ‘In Paradisum’ never fails to inspire and uplift.


“In the early days of Quaker schools, music was positively discouraged. Quakers were


3


opposed to instrumental music, comparing it to the Devil, and, according to our school history, if any of Sibford’s early pupils were caught illicitly playing music they had their instruments confiscated and even broken in two! “However, history also assures us that by the 1920s ‘music, dancing and art were now seen to belong to the angels’ so, I therefore thought that we would be safe with a piece of work that didn’t receive its first performance in the UK until 1936!”


Entrance to the The Friends Schools Choir Festival was free, thanks to the generous support of our sponsors: Edwards Insurance Brokers, Ecclesiastical Insurance, Ansvar and Congregational Insurance. A retiring collection raised in excess of £880 in aid of BYHP ~ the Banbury Young Homelessness Project.


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16