Music competitions, as anyone who has ever participated in one knows, are all about fighting back nerves and letting yourself shine in the moment. It can make all of those long hours of practice worth it.
The Sudbury Music Festival, which runs April 2-11 this year, features musicians of all ages and descriptions, from soloists to school bands.
To capture the spirit of the competition, Sudbury.com followed Lockerby Composite School’s jazz combo on the event’s opening day.
The students performed not only the classic “Song for My Father” by the Horace Silver Quintet, they also played their teacher Courtney Kirkham’s original composition, “Virus,” earning a silver award.
Kirkham said she wrote the song 15 years ago for her master’s thesis about the horrible feeling when you get a computer virus and your work is lost, something that is more rare these days, thanks to modern technology.
Check out our video above to watch the students perform “Virus”, as well as an interview with Kirkham and baritone saxophone player Kiefer Hilderbrandt.
Thank you to the members of Lockerby’s jazz combo: Kiefer Hilderbrandt (baritone saxophone), Ella Pagnutti (bass), Lilly Howsare (tenor saxophone), Lila Thomson (piano), Mason Vanden Berg (alto saxophone) and Zhengda Lu (drums).
Thanks also to Lockerby music teachers Courtney Kirkham and Mike Jensen and Sudbury Music Festival director Louis Simão, who helped us make this video happen.
Lockerby also had several other entries in the Sudbury Music Festival - its concert band earned a silver award, its wind ensemble a gold award and its guitar ensemble a diamond award. Lockerby student Jayden Harrison, who entered under the guitar solo category, picked up a gold and two diamond awards.
If you’d like to take in the Sudbury Music Festival, you still have until April 11. The syllabus is available at SudburyMusicFestival.ca.
The music festival’s Stars of Excellence concert and awards ceremony is taking place at 7 p.m. May 2 at St. Andrew’s Place.
Heidi Ulrichsen is Sudbury.com’s assistant editor. She also covers education and the arts scene.