String Quartet composition winners announced

The school’s quartet-in-residence, the Pavao Quartet, visited the school on Friday 23rd April to give another of their compelling recitals.

Alongside masterworks by Haydn, Bartok and Schubert, however, the audience heard two new pieces by student composers at Haileybury. These were the winning entries in the strongly contested, first-ever String Quartet Composition Prize, and the Pavao Quartet were exceptionally impressed by the quality of entries from which they selected a winner and a runner-up.

The winning composition was from the pen of David Gillespie (B) in the Fifths, whose jazzy and vibrant piece ‘Circuz’ captured the mood of the title with panache, and the Pavao’s performance offered an entertaining conclusion to the first half of their concert programme.

Second place went to Joshua Edwards (K) in the Middles for his emotionally charged work, ‘Desolation’, which the Pavao Quartet performed persuasively with great intensity.

The two winning pupils received certificates and financial prizes from the Director of Music, and all the entrants will be receiving recordings of these pieces made by the Pavao.