Music Scholars' Masterclass

On Saturday 3 December, we held our annual Music Scholars’ Masterclass.
With a larger-than-usual cohort of flautists among this year’s scholars, we were delighted to host the renowned flautist Robert Manasse to give the masterclass. Robert works as a freelance flute-player with a wide variety of orchestras including the English Chamber Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Welsh and English National Operas, The Philharmonia, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the London Philharmonic, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, and the Britten Sinfonia. It was wonderful to see him put our music scholars through their paces in repertoire which included Telemann, Debussy, and FaureĢ. Robert gave an extremely engaging masterclass which addressed not only the specific technical demands of the flute, but also broader musical issues such as rubato, phrasing, and rehearsal technique. All pupils were able to benefit from his excellent advice.