FINN MCLENNAN-ELLIOTT
Glenn Stanbridge New Music at St Paul’s Music has always been one of the subjects I valued as most important in schools. I took music every year of high school and was involved with school music in primary and intermediate. I have always believed it helps create a well-rounded student, as well as providing a necessary artistic outlet when surrounded by maths, sciences and literature. It was with great interest that I interviewed the new music teacher at St Paul’s College. This is a school that despite growing up right round the corner from I’ve had little to do with and so I was very curious to discover how the music department ticked and what Glenn Stanbridge had in store for its future. St Paul’s is a small school, with less than 300 students. Almost all of these are of Polynesian ethnicity. Glenn commented that the culture and community of St Paul’s is a bit different to what he’s used to. Despite this difference he admires the sense of brotherhood and family that is extremely important to the students and community. This is something he can relate to having grown up with a musical family that spent a lot of time performing and singing together. He declares them “real nerdy”, referring to family Christmases playing trumpets and singing carols together. This community sense of music is something that is strong and visible at St Paul’s and Glenn is excited to bring out more music in the boys, especially through performance groups. Having only recently arrived from Hamilton, Auckland has been a shock to the system for someone who is used to the slower life of provincial New Zealand, but he lives locally and the community of St Paul’s has been a welcoming environment. He has a Bachelor of Arts - majoring in music and minoring in social geography, and a Bachelor of Teaching, and this is his first year of teaching full time, although he has spent the last couple of years working part time in schools in Hamilton. He fills the role of music teacher, social studies teacher and itinerant music teacher at St Paul’s, so he has his work cut out for him. He plays piano, sings and was brought up in a brass family. His father is an itinerant brass and woodwind specialist, and his siblings are both music teachers too. Music runs very strongly in the family, although he says ironically he doesn’t get to “do music a lot” at the moment, due to time constraints of creating and teaching a new music curriculum. St Paul’s does not have a NCEA class as yet, and one of Glenn’s primary objectives is to move his year 10 students on to level one music next year. He’s aiming to achieve this through the development of their already strong performance culture, augmenting this with more advanced theory knowledge. Level one music has a large performance component, as well as composition, at which he is certain his boys will excel. “They have more talent in their little finger than in my whole body,” he says. He’s excited to be able to see his year 7 students have an entire three year NCEA curriculum ahead of them when they hit year 11.
CULTURAL ICONS REACHES 70 EPISODES In 2010, as a result of contact with some remarkable people, the Depot Artspace began producing a series of filmed interviews celebrating New Zealanders who have contributed significantly to our creative landscape. Cultural Icons is an inspirational series that shares the histories, stories and experiences of some of our most significant visual artists, architects, publishers, entrepreneurs, writers, musicians, arts commentators and philanthropists. The interviews, which have taken place in the Depot Sound studio, have been conducted by friends and colleagues chosen by the interviewee and are subsequently intimate, informative, entertaining and enlightening. Interviews include Stanley Palmer, Ian Wedde, Denys Trussell, Claudia Pond Eyley, Nigel Brown, Hamish Keith, Roger Horrocks, Barry Brickell, Riemke Ensing, Eve de Castro Robinson, Helen Pollock and Gordon McLauchlan. "[These interviews] constitute an invaluable national resource for the benefit of the public at large... an acknowledgement of the work of people who have brought about change and development in New Zealand," says Rodney Wilson, former director of the Auckland War Memorial Museum and Auckland Art Gallery. To celebrate reaching 70 episodes a publication has been put together profiling the 70 interviews, and it allows access the full interview online free of charge by clicking on each Cultural Icon photograph. They are a valuable and accessible archive for researchers, students and or anyone interested in the New Zealand vernacular and the people who PN either gave it form or insight. F You can find the online copy of the publication here: www.issuu.com/depotartspace/docs/cultural_icons_70_episodes
One of his major interests in music is composition, with a particular passion for the surrealist genre (one I’ll admit I had to explore more to understand after my interview). He explained the way surrealist music can be created like a mathematical equation, using phone numbers and names, and is often juxtaposed with other noises, like jet planes, to create a trippy and atmospheric experience. It is not music that many people will have come across, or find themselves listening to and this is important to Glenn because it opens up his students to genres that aren’t just inside the “pop box” of modern melodic music. “We don’t want to just churn out people doing one genre,” he says. It’s important to grow well rounded musicians. One of the first things he is planning is to start a school choir; he believes that over half the school could be part of this. “You should hear these boys sing at mass on a Wednesday afternoon,” he tells me, “They are amazing.” Singing is part of their culture, in church, at school and in their communities, and he believes having a choir will help to cement school as part of that wider community. He plans to start with a Tongan song, and get them to teach this to him, and then introduce a more traditional four part harmony song - so they can learn ‘his songs’ after he learns theirs. Currently being the only itinerant teacher he takes classes of pianists, guitarists, drummers and vocalists (as well as a stray flautist and euphonium player). There is a waiting list for these classes, which bodes well for an exciting next few years of music PN for the school. (FINN McLENNAN-ELLIOTT) F Finn McLennan-Elliott is studying for a Bachelor of Science Honours Degree, specialising in human geography at Auckland University. In his spare time, Finn plays the clarinet and guitar. He has a great appreciation of all types of music. E: finn.huia@gmail.com
134 PONSONBY NEWS+ May 2014
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