Music

Music is woven into the very fabric of St Edmund’s School and we enjoy an excellent reputation for the range and quality of our music, both in performance and academic areas.

The Junior School is the proud home of the Choristers of Canterbury Cathedral and the East Kent Children’s Orchestra, whilst the Senior School is renowned for its fine Symphony Orchestra, Big Band and Choirs. Across all areas of St Edmund’s, we enjoy a flourishing partnership with the English Chamber Orchestra, a relationship that sees our instrumentalists work regularly with members of this international ensemble. Click here from more details.

The department occupies a purpose-built Music School, opened by Freddie Kempf in 2004. The accommodation comprises a Recital Hall, Recording Studio, three classrooms, ten teaching/practice rooms, a Music Technology lab, and staff offices. The Music School is adjacent to the theatre, which allows for close co-operation between the Music and Drama departments.

The School offers generous Music Scholarships and Exhibitions each year for entry to both Junior and Senior Schools, for whom a special programme of enrichment is organised, including master classes, lectures and concert trips, to ensure that they enjoy a rich musical journey through their time at the school. Past Scholars include Freddie Kempf, 1992 BBC Young Musician of the Year and now an international concert pianist, and a number of others have obtained places to study music at top music colleges including RNCM, RSM, RAM and GSMD as well achieving choral awards at Oxford and Cambridge.

Music in Abingdon House and the Junior School

The depth of music making at St Edmund’s is visible right from the start. In the early years of the Pre-Prep School, some 30% of pupils take individual music lessons to complement their weekly class music and choir practices. These young pupils, at a crucial stage of their musical development, enjoy fortnightly Kodaly based workshops with senior school staff, and regular instrumental demonstrations and tasters from senior music scholars and visiting music teachers. The Abingdon Choir includes all pupils from years 1 and 2, and regularly performs in and around the school community, culminating in the Little Voices festival, which brings together schools from the surrounding area in a festival of song. Instrumentalists receive either individual or group tuition and are encouraged to integrate in Junior School activities as much as possible. The Junior School Music Festival is one such avenue that enables more advanced pupils to exhibit their skills in a competitive, yet friendly, environment. Abingdon House produces a number of public performances during the school year, including Nativities at Christmas, Easter presentations and a summer term chapel service.

In the Junior School, pupils enjoy a wide variety of musical opportunity. As the home of the Canterbury Cathedral Choristers, singing is close to everyone’s hearts at St Edmund’s, and this is visible through the wealth of choral opportunities available to pupils from Form 3 – 8. In addition to the grandeur of the Choristers, Junior School choirs participate in main school services, including our Carol Service in the inspirational surroundings of Canterbury Cathedral, as well as many secular performances throughout the year.

The East Kent Children’s Orchestra brings together pupils from St Edmund’s and instrumentalists from outside the school to form a Symphony Orchestra on a scale rarely encountered in prep school environments. This 50 strong ensemble forms the backbone of our instrumental initiatives and is a group that we are justly proud of. Regular work with specialists from the English Chamber Orchestra offers an outstanding quality of orchestral coaching, as the group tackle an eclectic mix of repertoire from both classical and popular traditions.

The Junior School Music Festival offers instrumentalists and singers valuable performing and competitive experience in addition to an established routine of ABRSM and Trinity Guildhall examinations, whilst, for all pupils, the Inter-House Singing Competition brings all pupils together in an annual programme of rehearsals and performance to an external adjudicator.

At 11+, Music Scholarships offer generous fee reductions, alongside a rich array of opportunity for the more gifted to develop as musicians in these nurturing surroundings. Contact the music department for further details.

The instrumental and general musical education of the Cathedral choristers is an important responsibility. There are 25 boys in the Cathedral Choir House, each one of whom studies two instruments and theory, and they also receive vocal tuition in the department. The Choristers enjoy full access to the broad range of activities in the music department and, in addition to their commitments in the Cathedral Choir, are usually members of the East Kent Children’s Orchestra or, in exceptional circumstances, the St Edmund’s School Symphony Orchestra.

Music in the Senior School

In the Senior School, music is entwined into every aspect of school life. Chorally the school is established as a leader in its field, which a great many former choristers amongst our pupil body. The Chapel Choir sings in regular services, both in our school chapel and in Canterbury Cathedral, whilst the Chamber Choir (finalists in Top Choir Kent, 2011) is our elite choir, singing more demanding repertoire, both sacred and secular. The Fifth Form Girls’ Close Harmony Choir offers a valuable training choir for the Chamber Choir, whilst performing, in their own right, throughout the year, and the ‘Ex-Choirsters’ offer boys training at the highest standard in close harmony singing.

The St Edmund’s School Choral Society, comprising pupils, staff, parents and friends of the school, performs annually with the Chapel Choir and the Cathedral Choristers in large-scale works, in our Gala Concert in Canterbury Cathedral. Recently these have included Requiems by Mozart, Rutter, Fauré and Duruflé, Haydn’s Nelson Mass, Pergolesi’s Magnificat, Rutter’s Mass for the Children, and The Armed Man by Karl Jenkins, Vierne’s Messe Solenelle and Widor’s Mass for two choirs and two organs.

The St Edmund’s School Symphony Orchestra is highly accomplished and contains several County Youth Orchestra players. This ensemble offers an extension to our community orchestral programme already established in the Junior School, welcoming skilled instrumentalists from other schools in the area, whilst also benefitting from our on-going relationship with the English Chamber Orchestra. The orchestra perform three times during the year, both in school and at local venues including Canterbury Cathedral.

There is a strong tradition of music theatre and the Music department works closely with the Drama department. Recent productions have included: Bugsy Malone, Guys and Dolls, and The King and I in Junior School, and Beauty and the Beast, Pippin, Godspell, and Return to the Forbidden Planet in the Senior School.

For any further information, please do not hesitate to contact the Music Department by telephone (01227 475620) or by email (music@stedmunds.org.uk)