Hastings Musical Festival

A Rockin' Road Ahead

From a fairly modest start offering classes in Piano and Strings, the Instrumental Section has, like Topsy, grown and grown until nearly every musical instrument, both conventional and unconventional, is catered for.

It is encouraging to see young people still enthusiastically playing the piano, strings, woodwind and brass often to a very high standard and these classes still form the backbone of the instrumental section of the Festival.  It is commendable that schools with all the pressures of their academic timetable are still able to produce excellent group and orchestral performances.

However, it is exciting to see the development of newer instruments, in particular the electronic keyboard.  This section goes from strength to strength and it is encouraging to see youngsters who do not perhaps have a conventional musical background achieve wonderful results on this very versatile instrument both on a solo basis and as part of a keyboard group. A new addition for the 2010 Festival is the Electric Guitar, so we can truly say we are catering for nearly all styles of music!

Our World Music class offers endless variety and has produced some entertaining and memorable performances – who can forget the excellent Samba Band and the exciting Swaziland drummers not to mention the Senlac Bells and the bagpipes. Hastings is one of a small number of festivals that includes an Accordion section. We are always very pleased to welcome a small but very enthusiastic band of accordionists to show their skills on this instrument.

Undoubtedly the most revolutionary development has been the introduction of the Rock Band classes.  Despite some initial trepidation and concern, these classes have proved most successful due in part to being able to provide a full professional sound system for the players.  It has been exciting to watch youngsters perform in this particular idiom and it is safe to say that the Rock Bands are here to stay, underlining the ability of the Hastings Festival to adapt to new ideas and grow

Music is a joy and we look forward to sharing this joy with a succession of performers in the Instrumental Section for many years to come.