- Romani music
- Edward Grieg
- Samuel Dushkin
- Britta Byström: Figures at the Seaside
- Schubert orchestral fragments
- Adam Riis
- The Cantata Singers
- Barack Obama
Learn to Conduct in London
Learn to conduct orchestras
on a one-year course based in London
Learn to conduct orchestras on a practical one-year course for serious students, based at Morley College in London UK (Waterloo). The sessions focus on laying the foundations of a solid technique. Classes consist of Friday evening 'theoretical' sessions (6-8pm) followed by practice with a volunteer orchestra on Saturdays (10.30am-1.30pm), all in a constructive and supportive environment.
Entrance is by audition and interview with tutor Paul Sarcich. Candidates should show a solid knowledge of music reading and theory.
Build a knowledge of standard orchestral repertoire. Works to be studied (and conducted) during Autumn Term 2019 include Haydn's Symphony No 92 Oxford, Beethoven's Symphony No 8 in F, Rossini's Tancredi Overture, Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture, On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring by Frederick Delius, Bizet's Jeux d'Enfants suite, Mozart's overture to The Marriage of Figaro, Schubert's Symphony No 2, and Dvořák's Symphony No 8.
Additionally, during the first term, there's the opportunity to work with soloists on Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D, Mozart's Piano Concerto No 21, K 467 and a series of works for vocal soloist and orchestra.
The course tutor, Paul Sarcich, is a New Zealand-born Australian composer based in London. He studied percussion in the USA and the UK, and progressed from playing percussion in military bands to an orchestral and freelance career. As a composer, he is largely self-taught, although he has studied with Leonard Salzedo in the UK.
Paul Sarcich. Photo © 2017 Susi Kennedy
Paul has taught music at all educational levels and in all formats. From 1991 until 1999 he was a lecturer in composition, percussion and performance-related studies at the Victorian College of the Arts School of Music in Melbourne, Australia.
Morley College is an adult education centre in central London, founded in the 1880s. Based mainly in Waterloo, but also in Stockwell, it has approximately 11,000 adult students, and offers courses in a variety of areas, including art and design, drama, fashion, health, humanities, languages and music. Morley's music department is well-known, and past directors of music include Gustav Holst and Michael Tippett. Other notable past staff members have included Cornelius Cardew, Walter Goehr, Anthony Milner, Mátyás Seiber and Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Classical Music Daily's editor, Keith Bramich, studied conducting with Paul Sarcich on this course at Morley College, for at least five years, and comments: 'Paul's skills include being able to describe the mechanics of conducting in easy-to-understand terms, and to give effective teaching to students ranging from beginners to music college graduates. The Friday sessions cover more or less everything the budding conductor needs to know, and the Saturday sessions, where students receive individual lessons on their allocated music, in front of the orchestra, are fascinating. I picked up at least three conducting jobs through taking part in this course, including one paid one, and also made many friends.'
The first term of the Morley Orchestral Conducting Class begins on 20 September and runs through until 23 November 2019.
Further information: www.paulsarcich.com/events.htm
Posted 11 September 2019 by Keith Bramich
