ICE_MAIN_MENU


Rotary Young Musician Competition | Local Heat | 2017

 

Pictured Above:  The competitors with Heathfield School head teacher Marina Gardiner Legge and Competition organiser Rotarian Tony Love

 ROTARY YOUNG MUSICIAN COMPETITION

  • The local heat of the four-nation Rotary Young Musician competition took place at Heathfield School, Ascot, recently (24th January). Organised by the Rotary Club of Ascot, in conjunction with the Rotary Club of Wokingham, the purpose of this first round event was to pick the best local entrants to go forward to a District-wide-competition (Berkshire, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire) in March 2017.
  • A wide variety of musical instruments featured in the instrumental class: - piano, violin, cello, clarinet, classical guitar, electric guitar and drums. Winner of the instrumental section was Hani Elias (Charters School) (pictured below), on Classical guitar, with violinist Charlotte Meeson (Heathfield School) the runner-up. Hani played ‘Capricho Arabe’ by Fransisco Tarrega and ‘Sunburst’ by Andrew York.  Charlotte played Adagio (1st Movement from Sonata No.1 in G minor) and ‘Allegretto poco masso’, both by J.S. Bach.    
  •  

The vocal section demonstrated an equal variety of genres, from Vivaldi & Mozart through Gilbert & Sullivan to modern stage musicals such as Carousel and Les Misérables.  The winning vocalist was Pheobe Parker (Heathfield School), with Sarah Pierce (Luckley House) the runner-up.  Pheobe sang ‘Poor Wand’ring One’ from ‘The Pirates of Penzance’ (Gilbert & Sullivan), ‘Laudate Dominum’ by W.A.Mozart and ‘Gimme Gimme’ from the 2002 stage version of the musical ‘Thoroughly Modern Millie’.  Sarah sang ‘L’amour est un oiseau rebelle’ from Bizet’s opera ‘Carmen’, and ‘If I loved you’ from ‘Carousel’ by Rogers and Hammerstein.

Chief Judge Geoff Horton said ‘The performances this year have been of a very high standard, and it has been difficult to select just two competitors to go forward to the next round’.  He added that the judges had decided to award ‘Special Mention’ certificates to Kate Batten (The Holt School) on clarinet, Rob Hill (LVS) on Electric Guitar, Asuko Ikenoto (Heathfield School) on cello and Michael Williams (LVS) on drums.

Certificates and prizes were presented by the Vice-President of the Rotary Club of Ascot, Hugo Winkler.

  • Notes for 
  • Rotary in the Thames Valley and Surrounding areas comprises some 1900 Rotarians in 60 Clubs stretching from Banbury in the north to Hungerford in the West, then eastwards to the outer suburbs of West London.
  • The Rotary Club of Ascot comprises more than 40 business and professional men and women who live or work in the Ascot area. The Club meets each week at Mill Ride Golf Club, and in a typical year raises in the order of £25,000 for local, national and international humanitarian works. See www.rotaryascot.org.
  • About Rotary
  • Rotary International in Great Britain and Ireland (Rotary GBI), part of Rotary International, has 1,800 clubs and some 50,000 members.
  • Rotary International was founded in 1905 in Chicago and is one of the world’s largest international service organisations with 1.2 million professional men and women as members. There are 34,000 clubs in 200 countries and geographical areas.
  • Rotary clubs are open to men and women who are business, professional or community leaders who want to use their experience for the benefit of others.
  • Rotary initiates local and global projects to promote world understanding and peace and improve life conditions for people of all ages and cultures. To find out more, visit www.ribi.org.
  • ROTARY CROCUSES – ‘PURPLE FOR POLIO’

In the autumn of 2016 the Rotary Club of Ascot planted 5,000 crocus corms just off Ascot High Street as a reminder of the work done by Rotary Clubs and local communities around the world to eradicate this crippling disease.  This spring has seen the first appearance of these new flowers – all purple because when the children receive their immunization they also have a dab of purple dye applied to a finger nail, so that they don’t inadvertently get inoculated twice.

Rotary Club President Andrew Vallance said "The Rotary Club of Ascot has been making cash contributions to Polio Eradication for many years, with the support of the local community.  We have planted these bulbs which will hopefully reappear each spring, as a reminder of the Community contribution and an incentive to everyone to continue providing support for this most worthy cause."

Polio was rife throughout most of the world until just over 30 years ago.  In 1985, Rotary launched its PolioPlus program, the first initiative to tackle global polio.  The Global Polio Eradication Initiative, formed in 1988, is a public-private partnership that includes Rotary, the World Health Organization, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, UNICEF, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and governments of the world

Since then, the Rotary movement has worked tirelessly to achieve eradication of polio, so that more than 160 countries have been cleared of the disease, and it now exists only in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and to a limited extent in Nigeria. India’s last case was over 2 years ago, and the country will be declared free if there is no outbreak in the remainder of this year.

Although the immunization costs are very small, the scale of the task has cost over £1.5 billion, and the expenditure will need to continue until at least 2021. Latterly the monies raised by Rotary have been trebled by the Bill Gates Foundation, and Rotary is now improving the public’s awareness of the programme by its ‘Purple for Polio’ publicity. Currently this is demonstrated by over 1 million crocus bulbs having been planted last autumn around the country, and including here in Ascot, as in the picture. By the generous assistance of the Racecourse, 5,000 bulbs were planted in a rectangle on the very south-east corner of the grass area of Car Park 6, close to the junction of the High Street and Winkfield Road.

Donations towards the continuing cost of this programme would be very welcome, and can be made by sending cheques payable to ‘Rotary Club of Ascot’, and posted to the Club c/o 11 Walton Drive, ASCOT SL5 7PG, all of which will be acknowledged if the donor’s contact details are given, preferably by giving an email address.

  • Photographs
  • crocus2017_IMG_5099 The rectangle of purple crocuses at the racecourse.
  • Notes for Editors:
  • Rotary in the Thames Valley and Surrounding areas comprises some 1900 Rotarians in 60 Clubs stretching from Banbury in the north to Hungerford in the West, then eastwards to the outer suburbs of West London.
  • The Rotary Club of Ascot comprises more than 40 business and professional men and women who live or work in the Ascot area. The Club meets each week at Mill Ride Golf Club, and in a typical year raises in the order of £25,000 for local, national and international humanitarian works. See www.rotaryascot.org.
  • About Rotary
  • Rotary International in Great Britain and Ireland (Rotary GBI), part of Rotary International, has 1,800 clubs and some 50,000 members.
  • Rotary International was founded in 1905 in Chicago and is one of the world’s largest international service organisations with 1.2 million professional men and women as members. There are 34,000 clubs in 200 countries and geographical areas.
  • Rotary clubs are open to men and women who are business, professional or community leaders who want to use their experience for the benefit of others.
  • Rotary initiates local and global projects to promote world understanding and peace and improve life conditions for people of all ages and cultures. To find out more, visit www.ribi.org.