Music of filmic proportions

In November 24 instrumentalists from Years 7-11 performed an original composition at the Royal Albert Hall, home to the BBC Proms. This performance was the culmination of a project delivered in partnership with the Royal Academy of Music and world-famous film composer, James Newton Howard.

The project began in October when students visited the Royal Academy of Music and had the opportunity to have a question and answer session with the Hollywood composer. Our students also got the opportunity to hear the Royal Academy of Music Orchestra perform extracts from Howard’s latest film score for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.  Three rehearsals followed at school that were led by students from the Royal Academy.  Our students created a piece of orchestral music that was directly related to one of the scenes from Fantastic Beasts.

The performance took place in the intimate setting of the Elgar Room to an audience comprising representatives from the Royal Albert Hall, the Royal Academy of Music, students and teachers from Marylebone School for Girls and James Newton Howard himself. A highlight of the performance included the textural explosion of the glissando cellos played by Alvi Rahman and Tasnim Islam (both Year 9) combining with the march-like brass played by Myrtle Frobisher (Year 11), Danette St Clair, Sarah Khatun, Zakaria Rasool and Jonathan Rensoli (all Year 7) at the climax of the piece.  Diego Andrade Alves (Year 8) closed the piece with a crashing, dissonant piano chord that rang out gong-like and provided a fitting sonic contrast to the sinister mayhem of music that preceded it.  Impressed with what he saw, James Newton Howard told our students that this could be the first step for them as potential film composers of the future.

L-R Sarah Khatun, Jonathan Rensoli, Freddy Root, Myrtle Frobisher, Alex Rowson and Zakaria Rasool