SOME 2,000 young musicians and singers will take part in the 114th annual ESB Feis Ceoil music contest which got under way yesterday.
The modern harmonies of the Flying Pickets song Only You emerged from the RDS yesterday as the joined forces of Dublin schools Belvedere College and Mount Sackville took part in a post-primary school choir competition.
The challenge of building a choir in the well-known Dublin rugby school reads almost like something straight out of American high school musical television show Glee.
However, the opportunity to meet the Mount Sackville girls at weekly choir practice provided great encouragement for the boys to get involved , said one of their choir teachers, Frances Stoker Phelan.
The girls’ voices also offered balance at a time when the teenage boys’ voices were changing, she said. Belvedere had come on from successes last year, having won the Wesley Feis for its voice and orchestra performances.
There has been a new push for music in Belvedere in recent years with a wind-instrument band of 140 boys built up over the past few years, teacher Marie Louise Bowe said. She said she hoped Belvedere would some day become as known for its musical feats as its rugby tradition.
The choir was awarded a “highly commended” but was beaten by stiff competition from the experienced, red-robed King’s Hospital Chapel singers.
Carolyn Holt (17) from Co Kildare is a boarder at the school and was the soloist in the 65-strong choir.
She practises once a week with the choir and also does extra voice training. Despite regular performances, however, she was nervous before the competition.
She loves singing and music and definitely wants to study music after her Leaving Cert next year.
How would she celebrate yesterday’s win? “I’ll probably have to do my homework,” she said.
School head of music Helen Roycroft said the choir was no stranger to the stage, adding that the singers were very disciplined because they performed every Sunday in the school chapel.
Donning matching silver dress and shoes, Isobel Howard Cordone celebrated her 13th birthday yesterday by taking part in the junior violin competition. It is one of six contests she has entered in the past fortnight.
The Dubliner has been playing since she was three years old. She practised every day for an hour and a half because she really enjoyed classical music, she said.
Already she has travelled all around Europe playing violin, in Budapest, Barcelona, Italy and Vienna.
However, she is more nervous playing in Ireland because she knows and is friends with many of her competitors.
Carrying a cello almost as tall as himself doesn’t bother Seán Keary (13), except when he has to get a bus.
He has been playing the instrument since he was about six and comes from a musical family, his father being a pianist.
Seán, who also plays rugby and goes to the High School in Rathgar, was in another Dublin cello competition on Sunday, where he was awarded second place.
“The pieces are contrasting, one is fast and the other is slow – like a lullaby,” he said of the pieces by Schumann and Albrechtsberger, which he has been practising since October.
“I played here in competitions myself in the 1950s and 1960s,” said Aisling Drury Byrne, his teacher at the Royal Irish Academy of Music in Dublin.
She had 12 students taking part in the Feis Ceoil and said it was very important as it gave them “something to work for”.
She said the feedback from the international judges could be very helpful.
Adjudicator for the choir competition was Peter Erdei, who is professor of choral conducting in the Ferenc Liszt Academy of music in Budapest.
He praised the collective strength of young people. Choir, he said, teaches self-discipline, self-respect and the responsibility to do well for your community.
Veronica Dunne stressed the significance of the festival in advancing the musical careers of young Irish people over the years.
Over the next fortnight choirs, pianists, vocalists, violinists, flautists and other musicians will compete at the RDS, St Mary’s Church, Donnybrook; and St Bartholemew’s Church, Ballsridge.
