Full house as the Braid is packed for Academy show

Tuesday and Wednesday’s performances in The Braid were sell-outs and the curtain went up at 7.30pm on each night to a huge variety and high standard of talent.

The Senior Orchestra got the spring concert programme underway in swash-buckling style with a superbly rousing and note perfect rendition of the Pirates of the Carribean theme which was hard to differentiate from the original soundtrack.

The upbeat tempo continued courtesy of Ballymena Academy’s ‘Rock School’ - the hugely talented trio of Peter Burton, Andrew Logan and Daniel Ross - who not only performed again in the second half, following up their earlier jazzy ‘Some You Win’ number with the similarly toe-tapping ‘Funkie Junkie’, but who popped up throughout the programme in expert support of a host of other musical slots.

Classical pieces were expertly delivered by both the Senior Strings (Arrival of the Queen of Sheba and Palladio) and the Wind Quintet (Minuet from petite Suite) while the Chamber Choir entertained with four songs in that style including an amusing take on ‘Old MacDonald’.

But, it was the Chamber Choir’s unscheduled, home-penned tribute to the Academy’s 1st XV - ‘O Fluffy Sheep’, sang to the tune of ‘When the Saints Go Marching In’, which brought the house down, aided in no small way by the appearance of the much coveted ‘School’s Cup’ itself.

Four members of the Richards’ family - Athena, Caroline, Eva and Lydia - were another unique feature of the evenings, appearing together ‘for one year only’ as a family string quartet to deftly perform Mozart’s Voici Sapete.

The audience appreciation continued as the Junior Wind Band performed a popular choice of ‘Big Band Superhits’ plus ‘Rockin’ Robin’ and the 150 or so members of the Senior Choir, who were to later close the night on a musical high, blasted out ‘Lean on Me’ and ‘Let’s Do It’.

A Michael Jackson percussion tribute by the ‘Wazo Batto’ ensemble also went down well, but the loudest applause was measured out in equal portions for Champion solo piper Alan Macpherson’s finger-flying selection of jigs and reels and solo pianist Steven Arbuthnot’s breathtaking rendition of Liszt’s hugely challenging Hungarian Rhapsody No.2.

The Senior Windband literally ‘Trailblazed’ the audience into the second half of the concert evenings with the theme from The Simpsons and a range of Hoagy Carmichael favourites and the Junior Strings proved just as enjoyable with ‘You Raise Me Up’ and ‘Lord of the Dance’.

Another treat followed courtesy of vocal soloist Sara Crockett, backed on her fabulous rendition of Eva Cassidy’s ‘Wade in the Water’ by Rock School’s Peter Burton on electric guitar.

The audience were chilled out further with some great Gershwin by Year 14 solo pianist Amy Stewart, not least ‘I Got Rhythm, before ‘the feather’s started to fly’ via the Year 14 ensemble’s traditional set featuring the light-footed Irish dancing talents of Emma McKay.

Variety really was key to the second half of the packed concert programme and the entertainment just kept coming in many forms.

From Zoe McQueen’s haunting violin solo of ‘Remembrances’ from the score of Schindler’s List to the all singing, all dancing Junior Choir and their colourful tribute to ABBA’s Mamma Mia musical, and, far from least, the percussion ensemble, who had every toe in the house tapping along to Tuck’s, ‘The Mystic Traveller’ and ‘The Mountain Rising’.

Performers aside, from the musical direction and continuity provided during the programme by teaching staff to the pupils’ who took on the role of stage hands, it was an amateur production that was professional in style.