This year, I was especially excited for chamber music. I’ve been involved in chamber music every year I’ve been at school, and since this was my last year, I wanted to make it a good one.

But let’s back up a bit first. You might be asking yourself what chamber music is. Essentially, chamber music involves a small group of musicians, usually orchestral musicians, who get together to play music. A chamber group is kind of like a rock band made up of classical musicians. About five chamber groups are formed each year at Logan Park in preparation for the annual Chamber Music New Zealand Chamber Music Contest, and this doesn’t include the groups formed in conjunction with other schools.

Altogether this year, 16 students from Logan Park prepared for the competition in seven different groups. Of those, three got through to the regional final, Nel Pardas-Antona, Aina Pardas-Antona and Charlie Sheppard. All of these three played in groups with students from a variety of schools. Charlie was also in an LPHS group with Vyvienne Evans and myself, creating a pretty strong group (if I may say so myself!). Unfortunately, the piece I picked out was just a bit too challenging, and I don’t think we gave ourselves enough time to get it to the standard we wanted. We had many fun practices – not always productive – and although we didn’t end up entering the competition, we did have a very good time. Another LPHS group, Be Bopped, (a saxophone quartet featuring Tim Copland, Ava Straw, Ethan Gaffney and George Maclaurin) won the KBB Award for excellence in wind playing.

Chamber music is easily my favourite style of music to play, and I would recommend it to anyone. It’s not just about winning the competition, it’s about creating music, building friendships and generally having a good time.