Guitar And Bands Concert Provides An Excellent Evening Of Entertainment!

The lengthy programme was testament to the amount of talent at Christ College and it was wonderful to hear acoustic and amplified music played with such evident enjoyment and determination. Mr Jeremy Herbert, guitar teacher at Christ College, had put a great deal of thought into an inclusive programme and despite the ever-present technical challenges of such an evening, it was easy for the assembled audience to be drawn into many of the performances, with a healthy dose of audience participation towards the end of the evening.

The first half of the programme was devoted to solo items; Peter Bowen and Jessica Facey, two younger performers, started the programme with two acoustic performances, before handing over to senior musicians Luke Skibniewski-Woods, Charlotte Guinan, Kento Kumagai, Jack Hall, Lewis Murray and Elinor Jones. Several of these senior musicians chose to accompany their own vocal lines and whilst it is always tough to single out individuals I will confess to particularly enjoying Luke Skibniewski-Woods’ renditions of ‘Blackbird’ by Lennon & McCartney as well as ‘I still have found what I’m looking’ for by Bono and U2, complete with harmonica solo. Jack Hall, a relative newcomer to the stage, gave a very powerful performance of his own song, ‘Recess’. Elinor Jones, now in her final year at Christ College, gave very assured and captivating performances of four pieces to round off the first half, including a rather touching airing of ‘The Call’ by Regina Spektor, a piece which she returned to having performed it in her very first concert at Christ College six years ago.

There was something for every musical taste in the second half of the evening; the Bowen family started us off with some fiery Django Reinhardt and after the Form 3 Trio’s performance of Manuel de Falla’s ‘Cancion’, Charlotte Guinan and Luke Skibniewski-Woods came together to perform ‘Bye Bye Love’, made famous by the Everly Brothers. The remainder of the programme was in the hands of three bands made up of senior musicians who did very well to entertain at the end of a long day. As well as some excellent cover versions of popular favourites, two home-grown pieces written by Luke Skibniewski-Woods and Doug Evans were particularly impressive.

Congratulations to all performers and technical team who worked so hard to prepare an excellent evening of entertainment.