Summer Schools

Summer Schools.

At end of July 2005 I went to Liverpool for the Liverpool Clarinet Summer School run by Andrew Roberts. This was a week's course. I have lots to write about it but will have to keep adding bits.

There were lessons on reed making, fixing etc... Plenty of masterclasses with special focus on particular works such as Brahms, Poulenc and Schumann. There were also some Cameo Masterclasses with the opportunity to play pieces we hadn't seen before. All these classes were very informative and interesting whether a player or listener and I have copious notes on new notes, phrasing and new pieces. We had opportunities to have lessons with Leslie Craven, Andrew Roberts and Victoria Soames Samek and I was lucky enough to have lessons with all three and learnt lots about embouchure, tonguing etc...

We had a daily clarinet choir run by Leslie Craven in which I played my alto clarinet.

Here is a picture of us performing in a museum in Liverpool. I am in the back row third from left in the purple top.

The highlight of the week was playing in the final concert. I played my own composition Prelude to the Land of the Long White Cloud and have a DVD recording of it which I am thrilled with. I also played with a quintet and we performed Clare Grundman's Clarinet Caprice.

These two photo's (as is the clarinet choir photo) are courtesy of Andrew Roberts and come from a CD of photo's he did of the summer school. I am on the right.

I made some really good friends on this weeks course and highly recommend it!

On 25th August 2005 I went to The International Clarinet & Saxophone Performance Course for a the day and a half. It also was fantastic and I had a fabulous time.

The day started off with breakfast. We then had a daily warm up session before an hour or so of clarinet ensemble playing. This was followed playing a clarinet & bass clarinet duet of a piece called A Salutation for Summer just written by composer John Hubert Smith.

I had a clarinet lesson with Philippe Cuper who is first solo clarinettist at the Paris Opera (Bastile and Garnier). Later in the day I also had a masterclass with Philippe working on Pierne's Canzonetta - this was an amazing and very educational experience.

During the day I also had a lesson with Victoria Soames Samek.

I performed Oberthur's Le Desir with Paul Chivers accompanying me at the lunchtime concert and I was very pleased with how this performance went as it was a new piece to me, plus I was playing on a new clarinet, mouthpiece and ligature!

In the afternoon I also had an opportunity to play in Jeffrey Wilson's jazz group and this was great fun.

In the evening I got invited to play in the evening concert in a sextet with Victoria, Jeffrey, Roger Heaton, another girl (so sorry I've forgotten her name) and Philippe.

The following day I stayed to lunchtime, bought several more CD's from Victoria (Clarinet Classics) to add to my collection and played in the Klezmar group run by Jeffrey Wilson. This was also such fun.

I went home on a real high!