Swindon Young Musician of the Year 2024

Sun, Mar 24th 2024 at 2:00 pm - 7:00 pm

Pianist Elizabeth Pope, a pupil at St John’s School Marlborough, is our Young Musician of 2024. In a closely contested competition she was overall winner, narrowly ahead of singer Bonnie Laker


After a gap of 4 years the Swindon North and Thamesdown Rotary Club’s Young Musician of the Year Competition was back.  It was the 25th and a souvenir programme was produced for the more than 100 members of the audience.  Twenty-four entrants in two sections, Junior and Senior, gave of their very best in this competition held at the Blunsdon House Hotel on Sunday 24th March.

The unenviable task of adjudicating the talented youngsters belonged to Mr Paul Turner, ARAM, GRSM (hons), LRAM, ARCM, FISM.  Paul, who lives locally, is a widely renowned professional musician having given masterclasses at such places as the Guildhall school of Music and Drama and the Musicfest Aberystwyth to name just two.

He had friendly and constructive advice for each competitor.  On summing up before announcing the final results, Paul said: “We’ve had a wonderful concert this afternoon, everybody has played and sung so well.  My congratulations to their school teachers as well, they work so hard.

RESULTS

Junior Section
1st    Elizabeth Pope, St John’s School. Piano: “Nocturne in G Minor” by Chopin.
2nd    Isabel Bartlett, Lydiard Park Academy. Piano: “Once Upon a Frozen Winter” by Heather Hammond
3rd    Shreyas Fernandes, St Joseph’s Catholic College. Guitar: “Allegretto” by Giuliani
Senior Section
1st    Bonnie Laker, Lydiard Park Academy. Voice: “When I Look at You” by Frank Wildham
2nd    Charlie Wright, Great Western Academy. Voice: “She Used to be Mine” by Sarah Bareilles
3rd    Nora Serhan, Kingsdown School. Piano: “Interstellar” by Hans Zimmer

Young Musician of the Year
Winner: Elizabeth Pope, St John’s School. Piano
Runner Up: Bonnie Laker, Lydiard Park Academy. Voice

The Worshipful The Mayor of Swindon, Councillor Barbara Parry, presented silver trophies to the Winner and the Runner Up.  There was also one for the winning school, St John’s, and every single competitor received a certificate of achievement and a medal.  A carousel of pictures is above.

The Mayor commented: “I love children being given opportunities such as this to showcase their talents and I congratulate them all as it takes a lot of courage to perform in front of an audience.”  And she had special thanks for the Rotary Club and particularly Rotarian Bob Humphries and his team for organising the competition.

THE PRE-EVENT INFORMATION

Swindon Schools have been invited to submit entries - entry is free of charge

The competition will be in two parts –
Part 1 for the Junior Section (aged up to 14 years )
Part 2 for the Senior Section (aged up to 16 years). 

There will be a refreshment break between the two parts. 

All competitors will receive a certificate of achievement in recognition of having reached the level of accomplishment required to enter the competition.

Audience members are welcome - there is no charge.

'What We Do' Main Pages:

Children's bereavement charity Wiltshire Treehouse is based in Swindon

more  

A Partner Club is a Rotary club that supports ShelterBox's work in disaster relief by donating over £2,000 in a Rotary year

more  

Rotary is one of the largest and most successful global membership and humanitarian service organisations in the world. It has 1.2 million members in over 200 countries.

more  

24th October is World Polio Day

more  

From Rotary Club local heats to national finals, Rotary Youth Competitions in a range of creative areas let young people’s skills flourish.

more  

Brighter Futures launched their Radiotherapy Appeal in 2015. Today, 7 years later, a ribbon cutting ceremony has taken place at the Great Western Hospital

more  

Giving money and support to the people in Swindon & district who need it most

more  

A brief summary of our Rotary year ending 30/06/2024

more  

£1286 has been sent from our Emergency Disaster Fund to the Disasters Emergency Committee UKRAINE HUMANITARIAN APPEAL

more  

Rotary’s second major donation, of £208,000, was handed over on 7th July 2021 when local Rotarians visited the Great Western Hospital to view the build progress of the nearly completed radiotherapy unit.

more  

We went to the races in March. It was a meeting with 10 races, 8 riders in each. It wasn’t at Epsom, or Haydock Park, or just up the M4 at Newbury. It was, of all places, in Wanborough Village Hall.

more  

"In musical entertainment Swindon punches way above its weight. Some of the youngsters we've heard tonight will go on to make a name for themselves"

more  

The Rotary Club of North Wiltshire (the name was changed to the Rotary Club of Swindon North in 2008) received its charter from Rotary International on 28th September 1966

more  

Rotarian Terry Williams' remarkable and unique fund raising effort, living in a ShelterBox emergency tent for a week in the Market Place, Highworth

more