Young Musicians Showcase

Just half an hour before the Young Musicians Showcase, the final event at our weekend arts festival, my 14 year old daughter Charlotte popped her head around the living room door. Her face was pale and her eyes were glistening: ‘Mr Head has died,’ she said. The head of History at the girl’s comprehensive had been involved in a terrible car crash earlier that week and we knew his prospects were grim. Nonetheless, it was still a horrible shock for Charlotte and her sister Katy to receive the email that confirmed their fears. I was with some new friends when she told me this news and Charlotte and Katy needed to get over to the church to tune up for the concert. I mumbled something about saying a prayer before the event started but wasn’t sure this was quite appropriate. One of the performers in the showcase had thought up a much better idea. When it was her turn to play, seventeen year old Lorna Nye took to the stage with her cello, sat down and said: ‘I’d like to dedicate this to Stephen Head.’ She then proceeded to play “Elegie” by Faure as she had rehearsed. Lorna had been a pupil at Tanbridge House School until a year ago and together with many pupils and staff from the school held him in very high regard. Like all the musicians who played that afternoon Lorna played with great technique and sensitivity, but her dedication before her piece added a whole extra dimension to the showcase.

Earlier that morning I had spoken at our thanksgiving service for the arts festival. My theme was the importance of festivals for the flourishing of a community. I read the passage from the Book of Revelation which describes all creation gathered around the throne of God singing the words which inspired one of the great choruses from Handel’s Messiah. ‘Worthy is the lamb that was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing!’ I asked the congregation to consider this eschatological scene as a magnificent arts festival just like the one we had been enjoying over the weekend. I highlighted the great tradition of festivals and celebrations recorded in the Bible from the inauguration of Passover which annually marked the Israelites deliverance from slavery in Egypt, to the regular celebration of the Eucharist in the early Church. I suppose I was asserting that the language and rituals of celebration were the default position for Christians and people of faith in good times and bad. This is not to escape from grim reality or live indulgently but to remember the eternal perspective which the passage in Revelation offers: the wonder, mystery and above all sacredness of life calls forth unceasing praise and celebration from all living things over and above all else. Furthermore, I suggested that the arts are a God-given language to enable us to celebrate appropriately. From the building of the Tabernacle in the desert, and onward throughout the ages in the Judeo-Christian tradition, artists and craftsmen have used their gifts to lead their religious community in celebration and festivity or lament and mourning. We need poets, composers and performers to help us to access and release the intensity of thought and feeling within us in order to express ourselves eloquently before God especially corporately.

The other point about festivals and celebrations I made that morning was that they provided a forum for initiating younger members into the rites and traditions of the adult community. According to the book of Deuteronomy, Moses instructed the fledgling Israelite community to teach their children all the laws that the Lord God had commanded them to follow. One of the most effective ways of doing this would be through the rituals of annual festivals and celebrations. In the service that morning, the worship was led by an all-age orchestra. Lads of twelve or so stood on the rostra from last night’s performance playing brass instruments of various kinds. Girls of a similar age and younger sat in the string section next to seasoned musicians from the congregation. We are too quick to segregate children off from the adult community. There is a place for Sunday school and any other kind of schools for that matter, but we should look for opportunities for children to participate in and even lead all age community events such as this. Lorna’s gesture later that day at the concert was a perfect example of just how much they can contribute. Through her simple and seemingly spontaneous words and subsequent playing of “Elegie” Lorna dignified and magnified the Young Musicians Showcase and affirmed that even in the bleakest circumstances we may continue to celebrate. Moreover the children raised £165 from the concert which will be donated to projects in the developing world. I’m not sure what impact Lorna’s words had on my daughters or the other children at the concert, but I imagine they gave them a sense that they can ultimately respond with eloquence to whatever life throws at them. There are few lessons more important than that.