Year 9 students learn importance of school song Year 9 students had special assemblies early in Term 1 to learn the history of the MAGS school song, and how to sing it well. The school hymn is sung at the beginning of every assembly and prizegiving, and while new students are often shy to begin with, they soon learn how to perform it with strength and pride. Choirmaster Mr Christian Malietoa-Brown gave a lesson to the Year 9 girls and boys separately, and with his encouragement and expertise soon had them filling the FW Gamble Hall with the song’s words. Archivist Mr Brian Murphy told the students about the history of the song and the meaning of some of its lyrics. It was written by a student, J.A.W.Bennett, in 1928, six years after the school opened, initially as a poem reflecting on his years at MAGS. Three verses were later set to music and became the school hymn. Mr Murphy explained how the lines about a legend being written “in golden rays” alluded to the sun’s rays falling through the hall windows onto the timber panelling along the walls in the afternoon. The last verse was relevant to all students who passed through the school. “You are all part of the fabric of this school, as were the students’ whose names are now on the panels around you. Singing this song with ‘reverence, duty and love’ is part of what binds us together as Albertians.” The boys and girls came together in a shared assembly after the lesson. Headmaster Mr Patrick Drumm said their rendition of the hymn was one of the best he’d heard. “All students past and present would have been proud of them.”
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MT ALBERT GRAMMAR SCHOOL
THE SCHOOL HYMN Dusk on the walls and the twilight lingering Darken yet lighten our half-dimmed gaze; While on the panels still bright with his fingering God writes this legend in golden rays; “Through hardship to glory” Mt Albert create us Such that our honour may live evermore: And these be our thoughts when in years that await us We shall look back to the motto of yore. Grant with the days then Mt Albert a reverence Springing from duty but vital with love That in the ending there be not a severance Torn in the pattern thine own hands wove. J. A.W. Bennett (Albertian)