New to this one were the smallest children in the Introductory section, who had renamed themselves The A Team by the time their parents arrived at Glasgow Royal Concert Hall to hear what they’d learned.
“We wanted to give an experience for young people who have only just picked up an instrument,” Benedetti explained. That included singing and body percussion, before they joined with the violinist and her teaching colleagues in playing a new piece, The Hidden Cave, composed for the occasion by Joelle Broad, and then combined with the older players in a special arrangement by Paul Campbell of the Shostakovich.
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Saturday afternoon’s performance also included some virtuoso music to inspire the players, when Benedetti and one of her own teachers, Andrea Gajic, played Pablo Saraste’s Navarra for two violins with a string orchestra made up of the tutors.
For ten-year-old Lucca Monaghan, from Our Lady’s Primary in Stirling’s Raploch, who has been playing the cello since he was five, it was a return visit. “You get to learn a new piece and make new friends,” he said. “It’s not just playing your instrument, it’s the other musical activities too.”
Josie Carlow from Kinross High School was one of the senior members of the cello section and a veteran of no fewer than six Benedetti Sessions, a singular record.
“It’s great to learn how it works to play in a big group,” she said. That’s the experience she’ll take back to her school orchestra, she said. “The Shostakovich Waltz has good bits for the cello. I’ve been able to hook up with friends I’ve met at other sessions, but mostly it’s new people.”
(Image: Colin Mearns/The Herald)
(Image: Colin Mearns/The Herald)
With Donnie Deacon conducting the huge string orchestra, the Waltz, Polka and Foxtrot from the Jazz Suite fulfilled Benedetti’s aim that each session introduces the youngsters to one great work that is part of the classical music canon.
“We want to make the music challenging and satisfying for each stage of their learning,” Benedetti said. “So there is new repertoire and a different experience each time.”
That applies to the director of the Benedetti Foundation herself as well, who admits that she doesn’t give a great deal of thought to how she makes time for the Sessions alongside her other commitments.
“If I thought about it too much I would do much less,” she said. “It would seem unrealistic. But I think I am getting better at sourcing the right people to help me, and trusting them to do what they do best.”