G l e n t h o r n e H i g h S c h o o l

S p e c i a l i s t A r t s C o l l e g e

Arts College

Update

VOLUME 1, ISSUE 21 JULY 2010

On Saturday 12th June 2010, Glenthorne High School hosted its annu-al Dance festival ‘DanceWize’. The Dance Festival aims to celebrate dance within the local community and to get all members of our local area dancing! The festival included performances from a range of groups including Junior Perfor-mance group, Boys’ Dance company and MAG&T dance company. The festival also offered work-shops, which were open to all members of the community in ‘Lindy Hop’, Capoeria and contem-porary dance. We also had a ‘Wii- Dance’ competition running throughout the day and confec-tionary on sale to raise money for the ArtsOne and A-D-1 trip to Edinburgh this summer.

The day started with a performance from Junior Performance group, Junior Performance consists of Glenthorne’s Dance selected pupils from years 7, 8 and 9. The group have been very successful this year performing in Impact Dance Show and various assemblies throughout the year. We also saw performances from our Year 9 Enrichment Dance Programme, where selected pupils meet before school once a week to develop their choreographic and technical skills. Performances by the BTec Boys year 10 class proved again to be a massive hit with the audience. To finish off the first set of performances, we were lucky enough to have the ‘All Star’ dance company performing a Lindy Hop piece which again was a huge success.

The Lindy Hop workshop was excellent fun as we saw pupils, parents and staff getting involved and trying their hand at a bit of jive dancing! The pupils all did really well and the workshop lead-ers commented on how quickly the pupils had picked up the moves and style. This was shortly fol-lowed by the Capoeira and Contemporary Dance Workshops. The Capoeira Dance Workshop was mainly attended by the Boys’ Dance company and the year 10 BTec Boys. The Capoeira dance style was something that none of the pupils had ever experienced before, however their attitude and participation in the class was outstanding and all pupils by the end of the class had improved their skills in the Portuguese dance style.

And finally our last workshop of the day was a contemporary dance workshop which took place in the Dance Studio. The pupils again did fantastically well and made an excellent impression on the London Contemporary Dance Theatre teacher. The pupils learnt numerous exercises and phrases which again helped them to develop technical and performance skills.

Arts College Update

2010

Arts College Update

Each year the Media Studies department develops and expands, finding new ways for Glenthorne Students to improve their skills and display their work. In April this year, the Media Showcase continued the tradition of screening best work from KS3Film Club, GCSE and A Level Media, A level Film Studies and our new course, Video Production. Many Media students are multi-talented and, this year, 6th formers also performed songs from the musical and film ‘Chicago’. More Able, Gifted and Talented Students also had the opportunity to work with Cineclub, the national film organisation, creating several films using specialised cam-era equipment under the guidance of an industry profes-sional. A Glenthorne piece of work ‘WHYT’ was consid-ered of exceptional quality and from centres across the UK was selected for the award screening at the National Film Theatre. This can be viewed on FROG in the Me-dia Studies Cineclub folder. We will continue this link in the new school year and look forward to showing our films again. Any students who wish to explore the world of Media and Film are welcome to join Film Club which will run every Thursday after school from September 2010.

Review of Challenge Week 2010

This week, my group and I have been making moving backdrops for the public performance on Friday that will be performed by the Dance and Drama groups. On Tuesday, we went to Nonsuch Park to get as much footage as we could for the backdrops. All day we were moving around plac-es, filming trees and woods. The next day, Wednesday, we went to watch a performance in the open air theatre of Macbeth. This was so that we knew what the backdrop for Macbeth should contain and look like. Today, Thursday, we spent all day putting together and editing our footage, one show at a time. It’s been hard work but I’m sure it’s going to pay off tomorrow!!

By Jack Hobbs - 7L

Arts College Update

of Awards Evening 2010

Awards Evening was a good night full of entertaining music from The Jazz Band playing ‘Gonna Fly Now-’ ‘Rocky’ and ‘A Night in Tunisia’ - Miles Davies and the band 10:46 performing the song ‘Take Me back to the Paradise City’, originally sung by Guns and Roses. Also we had the school percussion group ‘Glenthorne Breakz’ perform an upbeat song that made the floor vibrate. Lastly, year 10 student Daniel Shao perfomed flute move-ments 2 and 3 of Muczynski's preludes for unaccompanied flute; the movements were beautifully presented and it shows that if you work so hard you can get to a standard as high as that! Our guest celebrity, Paul Clement, used to work here years back as a PE teacher and then his dream came true, when he became first team coach for Chelsea Football Team. He has been a real inspiration to many of the students here as it is the football year of The World Cup 2010 so it really inspires them to achieve their dreams like he did! By Megan Harris - 9N

After winning a composing competition, Glenthorne pupils recently had the fantastic chance to work with the Royal Opera House's conductor Tony Pappano on their own Fanfare ‘Bloom’. ‘Bloom’ is now in use in the Royal Opera House until August as the Fanfare to call the audience back to their seats after the interval.

O2 Music Concert!

Arts College Update

On 6th July, the choir had the opportunity to sing at the O2 as part of a massive singing event with almost 6,000 other children!

It all began in February, when we started to rehearse and started to get excited. Over the next couple of months we learnt the songs and the harmonies and finally the dance moves. After many, many rehearsals we came to the rehearsal session at the Brentwood Centre in Essex, where we met the conductor, Robert and the choreographer, Darrell (who was very popular).

It was really hot that day but before we knew it the rehearsal was over and it was time to travel home. It was a long weekend’s wait until our final rehearsal at school on Monday before the con-cert on Tuesday night. The theme of the concert was James Bond and was called ‘Licence to Thrill’. We set off from school at break and arrived at about half past twelve where we had a quick lunch before entering the venue for the first time.

Glenthorne choir were seated high up in the arena and it was very high but we soon got used to it. We were fascinated by the acting and soloists during the final rehearsal and were now really ready to get to the final show and just go for it.

We had a break for dinner, then finally took our seats for the concert and waited patiently for the guests to arrive. When they did it dawned on us that we would be singing here tonight in front of all those people. The show started and we went through act 1 singing songs like ‘Kung Fu Fighting’, ‘Bad’ and ‘Greatest Day’. Then came act 2 with spectacular effects with mirrors and torches covered in rainbow coloured cellophane. All too soon it was the finale. It was a shame it had to end because after all our hard work it was over. We cheered the special guests; Andy from Blue Peter, 3 of the Dorothys from ‘Over the Rainbow’ and some of the cast of Hollyoaks.

Many of us met our parents outside the arena in front of the banner I had made and it was time to go home. We arrived back at school at about half past eleven, very happy with ourselves but exhausted. A very big thank-you to Mrs Grinnell and all the other music teachers for organising this for us. It was a fantastic experience and one we will never forget. By Emily Bennett 8S

LIVE

Photos By Adrienne Santos

On June 10th, LIVE took place, a new music showcase organised by 8 of Glenthorne’s 6th for-mers. As part of the BTec music course, the students had to work together to put on a music event, each student was allocated a different role, they decided on a name for the show and decided that the money made would go to the St. Raphael’s Hospice, a new venue was also chosen, the amphitheatre in the main playground, to make LIVE an outdoor event. In January, auditions were set up and from these, the BTec class came up with their final set list for the show; many of Glenthorne’s usual bands played such as 38th Parallel, 10:46, Haz-ardous and many others, the set list also included some bands which were playing their first performance such as Breaking Point and a Beatles tribute band. LIVE also saw the reunion of Soul Machine and the return of The Kicks. On the day of the event, Live was moved into PDH due to poor weather not allowing an out-door event, however the evening was still successful with the BTec class opening the show and it ending with an encore from The Kicks. LIVE managed to raise over £300 for St. Raph-ael’s and all of the BTtec class got distinctions for putting on such an amazing show.

Arts College Update

Arts College Update

An experience like no other, a parent's perspective

For many years, I have been fascinated by pots and most particularly those made in ceramics as they capture places and people over time. I buy them wherever I go for their origins, their shape, their use, their texture, their colour or just as a keep-sake for a particular event or trip. I also buy them as gifts for friends who are collecting particular pieces. So when joining the workshop, my first reason was really about trying to decode the secret of how these pots were made and hopefully learn how to make some of my own. I was also hoping to do something relaxing for a change and meet new people.

In any memorable experience, you need a learning environment and the school certainly offered that. Imagine a large laboratory with high tables and chairs all around in a U shape and art pieces oozing creative ideas, some works in progress others at a concept stage all around us.

You then need a great teacher and Mrs Mackay provided us with a profusion of knowledge and skills, ideas, patience and encouragement to take bigger risks with our work with plenty of practical demonstration to turn our creative imagination into a reality.

And finally you need keen students, mums brought their daughters and daughters brought their mums. After all, what a great opportunity to celebrate Mother's Day or rather mother's time in such good company. Some others came by themselves, like one particular young pupil who was to-tally self motivated. It was also good to see staff joining in, too.

I would recommend this workshop to everyone as an opportunity to spend time and learn some-thing new as a family. I really felt a great sense of achievement not only about what I made but to have shared this with wonderful women and a fantastic teacher.

Over the three sessions I completed four pieces which I hope to collect after Easter when they will have been baked and glazed. They too, will have captured a special time in a special place with spe-cial people, so thank you to Mr Andrew Platt for making this possible from all of us.

By Mrs Danielle Calderon

Arts College Update

For all enquires please contact Susan Kirby, Arts Administrator Phone: 0208 644 6307 x 242, fax: 0208 641 8725

Email: ski@glenthorne.sutton.sch.uk

Sister act

On Wednesday 16th June, the KS3 selected pupils went on a trip to the West End. The show we saw was Sister Act. The one thing that shocked me was that they didn’t have any of the original songs that I know from the film. I also thought the normal-sized programme was very expensive, but of course, it is a very popular musical, so they know the audience has enough money! I thought the actors played very well, but I didn’t like the policeman because he didn’t look anything like the usual policeman in the original film. But I liked Shank because you actually be-lieved he wanted to shoot the main character, dead on the ground, I also thought that they should have changed the man who played Shank to play the policeman because he exactly looked like the one in the film. The singing and dancing was amazing and the set was really creative. It turned around to show different rooms in different places. An excellent trip and time had by everyone. By Rebecca Jensen - 7C

Selected Student reviews!

Immersion Day and Sherwood Park

On 15th June, we had the privilege to work alongside Sherwood Park School. At Sherwood Park they take care of disabled children and they really enjoyed working with us. The Im-mersion Day was all about the Beatles. It involved a combination of Drama, Dance and Mu-sic. We all put 100% into making the performance great for the elderly crowd that came to watch and making Sherwood Park welcome. We made the pupils feel welcome by having two students from each form to be Sherwood’s personal guides. We all sang A Hard Day’s Night, When I’m 64 and The Long and Winding Road. We also danced to Twist and Shout where one pupil from Sherwood Park was in their element. It involved a series of turns and gestures. During the drama part, Sherwood Park could not join us, but we made scenes dis-playing the different technology and how life would be from the 1960s to now. For period five, we performed to a few elderly ladies and gentlemen and they were humming all the tunes and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. By Charlotte Keogh - 7R

Arts College Update