The four premier instrumental Westlake music ensembles toured around the North Island during the last week of Term 2.
There are 112 talented students from WGHS & WBHS who are members of the Westlake Symphony and Chamber Orchestras and Westlake Concert and Big Bands. Additionally, there were eight music staff to conduct and supervise, so the tour group required three coaches and a gear truck to travel around.
The tour started on Sunday 4 July, with a long scenic drive along the Desert Road to Palmerston North. Here, the Westlake students worked with the students and music staff from Palmerston North Boys High School. The exchange began with an impressive powhiri, and followed with musicians from both schools workshopping joint pieces that they performed together in the evening concert. It must have been a record for the Speirs Centre to have around 160 musicians on stage for the final item “Pokarekare Ana”.
Due to the Level 2 lockdown in Wellington a few weeks before, the itinerary of the tour took a detour to Napier instead. This meant that the tutors from the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and New Zealand School of Music had to fly to Palmerston North to workshop with our Westlake students the next day. This was a fantastic opportunity to learn and develop greater musical skills from the top professionals in the country.
In Napier and Hastings, the Westlake groups performed to a packed school hall full of Napier Girls’ High School students. The next day, our groups enjoyed another musical exchange with local students from surrounding high schools at the amazing new auditorium “The Blyth” situated at Iona Girls High School. The facilities were state of the art, acoustically designed with a very fine Faziolli grand piano for the pianists to enjoy playing.
After four days of intensive rehearsal and performing, it was time to enjoy some sightseeing on our travel back to Auckland. The first activity was a much needed soak and waterslide fun at De Bretts hot pools, Taupo. Then onto Rotorua, where everyone enjoyed a wonderful final tour dinner together and were treated to Cook Island and Maori songs and dances at the Mitai Maori Village – the hangi was plentiful and delicious! The last activity was riding the Skyline cable cars up and luging down again before driving back to Westlake on Saturday 11 August.
All the staff and students thoroughly enjoyed the music making and team bonding that occurred over the week away and it was excellent preparation for the groups to compete in the KBB Music Festival in mid-August.
