SMAHK students were fortunate to have the opportunity to perform in studio recitals during the month of November. Recitals were held in the Lecture Hall at Sheung Wan Civic Centre, and in the Recital Hall at Hong Kong City Hall. It was so fun that all of our recitals were joint recitals this year, as that gave us another special opportunity to continue to build our feeling of community with many family members and friends supporting each student as they performed. Parents have commented about how much they have noticed the growth in the students from one year to the next. Congratulations to all of the students and their parents for their consistent listening and practicing that let them have such positive experiences! Please enjoy these photos from our studio recitals:
Reflections from the Performers: Sander & Ayden Book 2 Violin Recital
On Friday, 15 November, Ayden and Sander performed their Book 2 violin recital in front of a big audience of family and friends. Here are their thoughts on the experience:
~Ayden’s reflection
Last Friday, I had my violin book 2 recital with Sander. Although I felt a little nervous, but mostly felt excited of having many friends came to support us. I was nervous on Gavotte from Mignon piece because I lost track a bit towards the end of the song. However, I felt very confident to play my solo pieces and pieces that I played with Sander.
Many thank to Ms. Diane and Ms. Ryoko by teaching me how to perform well with my partner in the recital. I learnt how to give more clearer cue as a leader and copy the articulations, dynamics and bow divisions from the leader. Last but not the least, thank you Ms. Shoko for piano accompaniment. I look forward to having my next book recital!
~Sander’s reflection
At first I really didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want to do it at all until the actual recital. Now looking back I sort of wish that I could’ve had a more positive view on this. At the practice recitals they seemed more stressful than real one. In the end everything seemed to work out well. It was even a bit enjoying to play for our our guests.
My final thoughts are, hard work definitely pays off in the end and have fun while you’re doing it.
Thank you to all of the friends who joined the recital, and Congratulations to Ayden and Sander on their work!
Orchestra and Chamber Music Concert
The second weekend of June, our end of year celebrations continued with a return to Sai Kung for our Spring Term Orchestra and Chamber Music Concert. Once again, this concert was held in the fabulous performance space at Hong Kong Academy.
In our orchestra and chamber music program this term, there was a Mozart theme: every chamber group performed a movement from a piece written by Mozart, and one of the orchestra’s selections was also written by Mozart.
The orchestra and all of the chamber groups demonstrated the efforts that they put in over the term in learning to be great teammates in their ensembles. Throughout the performances, you could see the performers communicating with one another, and the orchestra members watching Ms. Yuko for their cues.
The teachers are already excited for Fall, 2019 to watch the students’ ensemble skills continue to grow!
Congratulations to all of the students, Ms. Yuko, Ms. Ryoko and Ms. Shoko for their hard work!
Annual Graduation Concert
The end of the Spring Term brought a whirlwind of activity and celebration!
The month of June started with our annual Graduation Concert. This year, we had graduates representing every instrument studied at SMAHK. Graduates included all of the first six violin Graduation levels, as well as a parent graduating from Violin Level 1! Our Twinkle students were wonderful in their role as presenters of the Graduation Certificates!
In addition to celebrating the Graduation Levels, medals were awarded to the winners of our annual “Go for the Gold” Challenge. This year’s theme was review. It was exciting to see so many students on stage wearing medals for the end of the concert.
We continued our tradition of ending the concert with Dr. Suzuki’s “Wishing”, sung in both Japanese and English and played by our more advanced students:
“We are all good children. Mother, Father, help us try to do our very best. Every Child Can Learn. Father, Mother, help us try to do our very best”.
Congratulations to all of the students, parents and teachers!
Reflections from the Performers: Oliver and Roger, Book 3 Recital
On Saturday, 18 May, Oliver and Roger gave their Book 3 Recital. Here are their thoughts about the experience.
~from Roger
Over the course of these few months, me and my partner(Oliver) have been preparing for our annual book 3 recital, where we graduate from our books, in this case book 3, and move on to explore and learn new pieces to play in book 4. In order to get ready for this performance in the academy, we have prepared “Crossover Lessons”, where either of us would go to each others lessons to first discuss who would be doing what, call back our long memories fragments of pieces, learn a few extra duets and practice daily until we thought they were the best that we could make do for the program. Unfortunately, some of the lessons that we were supposed to attend were canceled, mostly because one of us was sick at the time and the other forgot to attend the lesson at all. But, surprisingly, we still managed to pull of a good recital.
~ from Oliver
Within a few months, my partner (Roger) and I worked together to prepare for our Annual Book Recital. The hardest part in the early stages was deciding who was going to play which piece. I think Roger and I handled it quite well as we decided to have Roger choose which he wants in the first two songs and I chose within the second two. To get ready for our duet pieces, we had to find a time in our classes to get together to practice. I, being the forgetful person I am, forgot about it twice. But we found time to make up for it and practised our pieces and duets. During that class we polished our duets and have the opportunity to play together instead of by ourselves at home. Practicing together allowed us to figure out how loud we should play or fix our timing. All in all, I think we managed to do a great recital and I am very proud of Roger and my work.
