Even More Famous!

Click on this for some Japanese practice. This comes from today's Chunichi Shiinbun. Congratulations everyone.

The full report

A Triumph!

East Meets West in an Anglo Japanese Concert – 23 March 2009

On Monday 23 March at Oxford’s Sheldonian Theatre, nine months of careful preparation became a reality when the 75 strong symphony orchestra from Tokai High School in Nagoya, Japan joined forces with its counterpart from Abingdon School. The enterprise was a true cultural exchange - the Japanese boys were accommodated in host families of Abingdon boys for two nights from 21 to 23 March.

The Japanese orchestra proved to be a very disciplined outfit. Their 10 hours of rehearsal each week after school resulted in outstandingly impressive performances of Schumann’s symphony no 1 and Dvorak’s Carnival in the second half of the concert.

The first half of the concert witnessed the premiere of a new work, “Abingdon Tokai, A Festive Overture”, written specially for the occasion and commissioned by the Abingdon School Music Society - a work by Simon Whalley, whose new role as Abingdon’s Composer in Residence was announced by the Headmaster at the concert. It was an impressive way to start the concert, exploiting Abingdon’s orchestral strengths to the full and incorporating the famous “Sakura” folksong from Japan, evoking the notion of cherry blossom in the middle section of the work.

The main excitement of the concert, however, was experienced in a performance of Wagner’s Mastersinger’s Prelude with both orchestras combined – an ensemble of 108 performers, of Wagnerian proportions, including eight horns, six trumpets, six trombones and two tubas.

It was a magnificent and exuberant sound, which really “raised the roof.” The concert’s first half was concluded with Tchaikovsky’s exciting Romeo and Juliet Fantasy – a performance in which several Tokai musicians also collaborated.

The whole project was deemed to be a fascinating and highly successful collaboration of two very different cultures and much was learned and friendships forged between young musicians from different sides of our planet. It is exciting to think that a return visit to Japan by Abingdon’s orchestra might become a reality in 2010.

MAS

24 March 2009

This time in a week!

Thanks, Mary!

Thank you, Mary for these beautiful pictures of the Shedlonian. Mary will be the official photographer at the concert.

Thank You, NHK!

Thanks to NHK Nagoya for featuring us on their live news program.
Click here to see the report on the channel blog. Good Japanese practice!

Thank you, Japan Society!

Very happy to announce that our event has received a generous financial donation from the Japan Society. This society is dedicated to
the enhancement of UK-Japan links with the aim of providing a better mutual understanding of the cultures, societies and businesses of Japan and the United Kingdom.

Founded in 1891, The Japan Society is the longest established and principal non-governmental organisation involved in the study of UK-Japan relations.

A Message from Japan

Well done to Shogo and friends who made this video introducing themselves to the Abingdon boys.

Now You're Famous!

Abingdon in the Snow

Mr. Michael Stinton

Michael Stinton was appointed Director of Music at Abingdon School in 1987 and has been conducting and developing the First Orchestra there for over twenty-one years. Michael is from a family of musicians - his sister is the flautist, Jennifer Stinton.

A graduate of Worcester College, Oxford, where he was Open Hadow Instrumental Scholar, he studied the oboe at The Royal Academy of Music with the late Janet Craxton. His first post was as Assistant Director of Music at St Paul's Boys' School in London where he met his wife, the figurative artist and teacher, Clova Stuart-Hamilton. They live in Oxford with their three children.

Since 1992 Michael has been Conductor and Musical Director of The Thames Vale Youth Orchestra, working with many of the most gifted young musicians of Oxfordshire and Berkshire. Their next concert is on Friday May 1 in The Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford, where the programme includes Tchaikovsky's Pathetique Symphony.

Michael has led the Abingdon School Orchestra on a number of international concert tours to Central Europe in 1995 and 2002 and to Hong Kong and China in 2006, during the School's 750th anniverary year. He us very excited by the project of working with Mr Nishimara's Tokai Gakuen High School Orchestra from Nagoya and by the opportunities for cultural understanding and exchange that the concert offers.

1. Who is the living performer you would like to have dinner with?

MAS Daniel Barenboim - I am enthralled by his initiatives in finding links and common ground between nations who are not at peace - in this case Israel and the arab world.

2. Who is the dead composer you would most like to have met?

MAS Beethoven and Tchaikovsky -(their music is so original), Brahms (whose chamber music I adore) and Bach (who, on balance, is the greatest ever composer in my view)

3. What is your favourite piece of music (pre 1950)?

MAS Bach' St Matthew Passion and Brahms' Clarinet Quintet

4. What is your favourite piece of music (post 1950)?

MAS Shostakovich's Symphony No 10 (1953) which I have conducted twice and saw Rostropovich conduct with the LSO in one of his last concerts

5. What instruments do you play?

MAS I am an oboist

6. One wish for your department.

MAS More space! What we have is good, but, with 45 staff now, we are sometimes short of rooms.

7. What has the most exciting thing about being a musical director been to date?

MAS Generally, the opportunity to work with talented pupils and gifted and dedicated staff and, specifically, leading a really exciting and successful orchestral tour to Hong Kong and Beijing in 2006

8. What has been the funniest moment?

MAS Probably wheeling an upright piano, a gift to the school from a former piano teacher, on a trolley through the centre of Abingdon. There were quite a few surprised faces!

9. What has been the most difficult moment?

MAS A Christmas Concert one year when a really friendly school groundsman with whom I used to chat had a heart attack and died just before the concert was due to start. A great way to go, but very sad at the tim

Your favourite moment?

MAS Conducting my youth orchestra in The Royal Albert Hall in London in the Schools Promenade Concert some years ago.

10. What is your favourite opera?

Wagner's Tristan and Isolde

11. What orchestra in the world would you like to conduct?

MAS London Symphony Orchestra

12. What advice would you give to a young performer who is nervous before a concert?

MAS Think about the composer of the piece and not yourself - do it justice!

13. What venue would you most like to conduct in?

MAS Birmingham Symphony Hall with CBSO

14. Do you have a quick message for the other orchestra?

MAS Enjoy the experience and try to get to know the Abingdon musicians - they are a really talented, friendly and enthusiastic bunch of boys.

15. What song do you sing in the bath?

MAS I tend to shower - baths take too long and use too much water!

16. What is your hobby outside music?

MAS Spending time with my family and friends in France where we bought a house on Honeymoon in 1988 - Cooking, reading, walking, making music and DIY (Do it Yourself - home improvements/bricolage)

The Sheldonian Theatre

Click here and here for views of the Sheldonian Theatre where it's all going to HAPPEN in 2 months time.

Mr. Naoto Nishimura.

Mr. Naoto Nishimura founded the Tokai Orchestra in 1984 and has been its director and driving force over the past 25 years. We asked him a few questions. Click on the links for further enlightemnent.

1. Who is the living performer you would like to have dinner with?

NN: Ms. Noriko Ogawa, a Japanese pianist living in London, who played the piano three times with our alumni orchestra, called Ostmeer Philharmoniker.

2. Who is the dead composer you would most like to have met?

NN: Sebastian Bach, whose Matthaus Passion I like best, and Ludwich van Beethoven

3. What is your favourite piece of music (pre 1950)?

NN: Bach’s Matthaus Passion, all Beethoven’s strings quartet, all Beethoven’s Symphonies, Sir Edward William Elgar’s cello concerto

4. What is your favourite piece of music (post 1950)?

NN: Bernstein’s West Side Story.

5. What instruments do you play?

NN: I played the flute.

6. One wish for your department.

NN: A big concert hall with many rehearsal rooms

7. What has the most exciting thing about being a musical director been to date?

NN: Two concerts in Musikferein in Vienna to commemorate the 10^th and 20^th anniversary of our orchestra

8. What has been the funniest moment?

NN: I’m sorry, but I can’t remember!

9. What has been the most difficult moment?

NN: We couldn’t go abroad and have a concert to commemorate the 15^th anniversary of our orchestra.

10. What is the most memorable musical performance you have seen?

NN: Sviatoslav Teofilovich Richter’s first piano recital in Japan, when I was a high school student

10. What is your favourite opera?

NN: Mozart’s The Magic Flute

11. What orchestra in the world would you like to conduct?

NN: Berliner Philharmoniker, though I do not conduct at the moment

12. What advice would you give to a young performer who is nervous before a concert?

NN: Be confident in yourself because you have made various efforts.

13. What venue would you most like to conduct in?

NN: Berliner Philharmoniker

14. Do you have a quick message for the other orchestra?

NN: Have a lot of fun in playing music!

15. What song do you sing in the bath?

NN: Mozart’s Requiem!

16. What is your hobby outside music?

NN: Travelling in Europe, reading books, appreciating various kind of art, and eating tasty foods.

The Sheldonian Theatre

This is a picture taken inside the Sheldonian Theatre where we will be performing on March the 23rd. The Sheldonian is one of the most famous buildings in England and was designed by Sir Christopher Wren. It was completed in 1668. That's 341 years ago. Handel performed here in 1733.

Practice makes perfect!

Here are the Tokai orchestra practicing hard!