PARKSIDE SECONDARY School students who have joined a guitar ensemble are practising every day for the Pacific Northwest Music Festival.
Teacher Harold Feddersen is taking an ensemble group to the festival for the third time with different students once again this year.
Most of this year’s ensemble hasn’t played music before, but they are learning quickly, he says. Six students are taking part this year and his two past ensembles won the Phillips Family Award for Highest Mark Classical Guitar, Duet, Trios, Ensembles that comes with a $100 prize, which they spent on pizza, he says.
Last year’s ensemble was asked to play in the festival’s gala.
“I expect it (first place) every year,” says Feddersen. “I have very high standards and they (students) rise to it.”
The students are dedicated and practise only during school for about 50 minutes each day up until the music festival – more than the required twice a week, says Feddersen.
They learn individually and then come together to play a song as a group, he says.
The ensemble began at the end of November with music theory and reading music, and started playing the guitars in January.
Three of the students had never played a guitar before this class and only three read music, says Feddersen.
“Ian was in a band. Trevor plays a bit, chords and songs,” he says about students Ian Conlon and Trevor Barton. “One thing about Parkside students is when there’s something that needs to be done, they rise to the occasion,” said Feddersen, adding they’re “amazing people.”
The students in the ensemble, aged 17 and 18, are playing classical guitars, which are different than steel string acoustic guitars with a differently shaped body and three nylon strings and three strings with steel wrapped around silk or nylon, meaning they play softer notes, says Feddersen.
A foot stool is used to raise the student’s left leg that the guitar sits on – rather than on the right leg like a steel string acoustic guitar – and this positioning puts the guitar in the right place to play.
The ensemble is learning one song for the festival, Vivaldi’s Andante from the Mandolin Concerto second movement, which the students chose.
“It’s a really nice piece of music,” Feddersen says.
The ensemble will then play that piece and another one for graduation, he added.
Afterward, he has found that students usually keep playing guitar on their own.
“It’ a really neat opportunity for them,” he said, adding that private music lessons are expensive. “It’s a great way to connect with the students in a different way.”
Music and Friends sponsored each student and bought a classical guitar for each one and music stands. Kermode Vet Hospital donated the foot stools, he says.