This year, Reading Blue Coat has launched a new music initiative for all students in Year 7. Part of this was the fantastic All-Year-7 Concert which took place at the end of January. This featured all singing together in a light-hearted performance of Dracula! And all playing together in an orchestra made of nearly 100 students (COVID absences notwithstanding!). To do this, anyone who did not play an ensemble instrument was given group lessons by Berkshire Maestros in class time, and are now challenged to get their Grade I by the end of the year. Listening to the confident and committed sound of Mr Meehan’s “March of the Titans” you would not have known that more than half of the group had only being playing their instruments for 10 lessons.

The concert also included some excellent solo work by some of our students who are already accomplished musicians, and gave opportunities for singers and narrators as well. Mr Bond’s amazing lighting had transformed the Sports Hall, and highlights were captured by Old Blue Sidni Brener (2021), who has made an amazing trailer for us to celebrate the project, which you can watch here: