Friday 27 September marked the official completion of Phase 2 of the ‘Music and the Heart of the School’ project, with the grand opening of our new school entrance and St Cecilia Recital Hall.
Guests from all across the Queen Anne’s community, including parents, alumnae, governors and donors, arrived on a red carpet to view the stunning new entrance and reception area. All were impressed by the beautiful bright and welcoming space.
The opening of the wonderful Scott Music Centre in June 2018 marked the completion of Phase 1 of the project and the centre has provided our music department with new practice rooms, a Mac suite, an ensemble space for smaller performances and music offices.
Designed by Edgington, Spink and Hyne, the completed building transforms the experience of girls, parents and visitors as they arrive at the school and provides a versatile Recital Hall for larger performances and public speaking. State-of-the-art music studios further add to the outstanding music offering at our school.
This development has created top quality facilities that many specialist music schools, conservatoires and universities cannot match. The impact on the girls and the Queen Anne’s community has been enormous and the standard and range of performing has really taken off
John Padley, Director of Music
One particular stand-out feature of the new entrance was the ‘friendship bench’. This bench commemorates the friendship of two of our alumnae, Mary Webster and Mary Pearse. They met at Queen Anne’s in 1939 and remained the best of friends for over 80 years! Their relationship is a wonderful example of the lifelong friendships that are made at Queen Anne’s School.
We had the privilege of welcoming internationally acclaimed professional violinist Tasmin Little OBE, as our special guest to officially declare the new building open. Tasmin Little has had an extraordinary musical career. She has performed on every continent and in some of the most prestigious venues including Carnegie Hall, Philharmonie Berlin and Vienna Koncerthaus. In 2012, Tasmin received an OBE and last year she won the BBC Music Magazine Personality of the Year Award. Before the ceremony, Tasmin ran a strings workshop to share her performance knowledge with some keen Queen Anne’s young musicians.
Following a champagne reception, the guests took their seats in the new St Cecilia Recital Hall. It was hard to believe that this modern space was once an old kitchen, dining hall and gym (quite ahead of the times in the 1900s when it was unusual for young ladies to be taught gym!) Even 100 years ago, this space was used to practice music, and so it was fitting that it has retained its original purpose.
Tasmin wowed the audience with a captivating performance and spoke about her introduction to music, when her mother bought her a recorder at age 6, and her lifelong career as a professional musician. She also talked passionately about the importance of music education in schools especially in the current educational climate, where many schools do not offer music beyond year 9 and in some, it has disappeared altogether. This development sends out such an important message about the benefits and essential need for music to be supported and of its values for wellbeing, learning and creativity and Tasmin thanked the Headmistress and the Governing body for their support and vision.
After the wonderful performances and inspiring words, everyone gathered at the front of the school where all 465 students were gathered to see the ribbon cut. The whole school cheered as Julia Harrington thanked everyone for sharing in the celebration and Tasmin cut the ribbon, declaring the new school entrance and St Cecilia Recital Hall Open!
The afternoon continued with performances from our own Queen Anne’s musicians. The Jazzabelles delighted the audience with some very upbeat tunes, soloists performed in the ensemble space and singers showcased some vocal performances in the recording studio.
We would like to thank everyone who attended the opening of our fabulous new school entrance and St Cecilia Recital Hall, and all of the donors who made the ‘Music and the Heart of the School’ project possible. We are excited to see outstanding musical performances throughout this space for years to come.
