The week-long Jazz and Blues festival was launched on Monday 16th October with daily performances in the atrium throughout the week by talented Year 9 students, and ended with a spectacular finale concert on Thursday evening. The audience were treated to performances of Barney Bigard and his Jazzopaters’ ‘Caravan’ and John Coltrane’s ‘Mr PC’; in addition to a performance of Jazz standard ‘Fly me to the moon’ by the staff choir. “We’ve all been very excited about the Jazz and Blues festival and intend it to become an annual event. While we have a responsibility to widen students’ cultural horizons, we want to present music as something to be enjoyed,” said Janis Davies, Principal. “I put great importance on celebrating the achievement of our students. We have formal prize-giving ceremonies to celebrate academic success and these music festivals are a way in which we recognise our musicians. I’m proud that while other schools are having to reduce what they spend on music and other extra-curricular activities, we have been able to make a significant investment. Parents know that at Sydney Russell their children will have the opportunity to learn to play a musical instrument, sing in a choir and perform in concerts. I’m very proud of that.” said Ms Davis, adding that she believes the school’s music provision makes Sydney Russell very attractive to the parents of prospective students. Miss Edwards, Director of Music, explained that this is the most recent in a series of music festivals across different genres. “At Sydney Russell we love all music; and following the success of the Classical music festival earlier this year we wanted to devote a whole week to celebrating Jazz and Blues. Year 9 have been doing a scheme of work where they learnt all about this genre and composed their own pieces for assessment. The school now has two Jazz bands, one was not enough to fit in all the students that were interested!” she said. The school is looking forward to the next music festival, the genre of which is yet to be decided.