Music Opportunities At WCCS

William Carey Christian School has an excellent musical culture, with a variety of opportunities for their students to learn and perform. Here are just some of the platforms at the school, where students can learn more and gain experience with the guitar.

• High School Music Elective – From year 9 and above, students are able to choose music as an elective subject. Here they study more than just their instrument, they’ll learn about music genres, music history, notation, theory and have the chance to perform for their class as part of their assessments.

• Rock Ensemble – This is a group that meets once per week at lunch, where they work on guitar-based performances, usually revolving around the “rock” music genre. They typically have lots of layers of guitar and arrange just about everything, including the vocal melody, to be played on guitar. It’s a great opportunity for students to gain experience playing with other musicians. The Rock Ensemble group performs at various school events such as assemblies.

• Lunch Time Performances – These are occurring more frequently at the school each year. The sound team simply set up a sound system in the playground and students are able to perform a band item at lunch time. It’s pretty casual, as most people are eating or playing, rather than sitting and watching, is it’s ideal for those who experience performance anxiety.

• A Little Night Music – this is an event that occurs each year on a Saturday night, where students can showcase an item they are learning (or have learnt) in their lessons. It’s designed to be an acoustic night, so no heavy metal songs are played here. Acts are often very short pieces by young students, simply showing the audience something they are able to play.

• CAPA Performance Night – The school hosts a Creative And Performing Arts (CAPA) night each year, which is an event for students, parents and teacher to watch a range of showcase performances.

• Musical Orchestra – The school puts on a musical every two years and students are able to play guitar in the orchestra. There is usually only one place available and the position calls for some serious skills, so it’s usually more suited to the experienced students.

• Subject Selection Nights – The school holds information evenings for students who need to choose subjects for their electives, so it’s pretty common for a music class or group of students to perform at these events.

• School Assemblies – The school holds the occasional assembly and often ask one of the high school music classes to perform an item or two.

As you should be able to see, there are plenty of chances for students to learn and perform at WCCS, which is one reason they have such a great musical culture. I always encourage every guitar student to participate in as many of these events as possible, or at very least attend them as an audience member and then consider playing the a future event.