Abbey wins an outstanding Unison Competition

The Abbey won this year’s Unison Song Competition with a flawless performance of Accidentally in Love, by The Counting Crows.  Conducted by Amie King (U6) they were the first house to take the stage, setting an impossibly high standard for the others to match.  There were many entertaining and musical performances throughout the evening; clearly all houses had taken great care and time in their choices and rehearsing of songs.

The Abbey song was good fun, as well as good singing.  An engaging performance, some Abbey girls wore costumes from Shrek II.  They were always in tune, and sang with plenty of appropriate dynamic contrast.  In one section they sang a difficult modulating passage unaccompanied, and when the piano reentered they were exactly in tune.  It was very impressive.

Field House was awarded the Girls Highly Commended cup, with Summer Nights, from Grease, and Latham House was the Boys Highly Commended with Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl.

We were fortunate to have Robin Tyson (counter tenor and former member of The King’s Singers) adjudicate.

Mr Tyson said that he ‘was incredibly impressed by the commitment of all the pupils throughout the ten houses… it was a great evening; a credit to the school, the houses and the pupils.’

Talking about the winning song, he said it was ‘the most complete package both in terms of performance and musicianship, I was really impressed.  Of course, there’s a difference between singing soft and loud; there’s a whole range of colours beyond, and Abbey proved that they could show a variety of those.  Their unaccompanied modulation was very impressive also.  I loved it.’

More photographs are available to view in the House Unison Gallery.