Celebrating female musicians at the David Crighton Concert
On Sunday 24 February, the nineteenth annual David Crighton Concert featured a programme of music celebrating women’s contribution to orchestral music.
Alongside pieces by Mozart and Bach, the Jesus College Music Society (JCMS) orchestra performed a rarely-played overture by Fanny Mendelssohn and the world premiere of a composition by Jesuan and JCMS Co-President Joanna Ward (2016). The Master, Professor Ian White, presented the David Crighton Award to flautist Rebecca Kershaw (2017), who concluded the night with Mozart’s Flute Concerto in D Major.
The night started with Fanny Mendelssohn’s rousing Overture in C, Opus 24. It was conducted by student Dewi Rees (2016), who has recently been appointed a Fellow of the Royal College of Organists. Medicine student Hattie Hunter (2016) then performed Bach’s chamber piece, the Violin Concerto in A Minor, in her seventeenth concert with JCMS.
The second half began with the world premiere of student Joanna Ward’s composition a different kind. This unique orchestral score was made by hand with paints, brushes, scissors and glue, designed to grasp swirling clouds of instrumental sound beyond conventional notation. “I really enjoy approaching things using those more abstract graphics sometimes,” said Ward, who was recently awarded a scholarship for a Masters in Composition at the Guildhall School in London. “Usually that translates into a conventionally notated piece, but with this I wanted to experiment with leaving it. It’s much more free and the player has to be much more involved with interpreting it because there’s no direct literal meaning. It’s about getting the orchestra a bit more involved.”
Second year Linguistics student and flautist Rebecca Kershaw received the David Crighton Award from the Master. First given by David’s wife Joanna Crighton in 2001, the prize is awarded to a first- or second-year undergraduate who has shown outstanding craft as a performer or conductor. Kershaw concluded the evening by performing Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Flute Concerto in D Major, using this notoriously challenging piece to explore the instrument’s full range.
Former Master Professor David Crighton, who passed away in 2000, had a lifelong passion for music. The David Crighton Music Fund supports Jesus’s vibrant music community by providing financial assistance with music tuition costs, the award of an annual prize, and sponsorship for special nights such as this one.
