St. John Fisher Elementary Sr. Makes Top 3 in Two CBC Music Class Challenge Categories
by Chloë Ranaldi
St. John Fisher Sr. Elementary’s Instrumental Group (grade 4-6) won first place in the CBC Music Class Challenge in the Elementary Instrumental Category.
Read the results on CBC Here.
This is the elementary school’s 2nd year in a row with a first-place win.
The students performed “Fille à porter” by Ariane Roy and Lou-Adriane Cassidy.
Their win in the National music challenge secured them $3,000 in new musical instruments and a plaque.
The judges praised the group: “Way to go musicians at Saint John Fisher! Great musicality, and forward momentum in your performance. Such a rich array of instruments and all well played.”
St. John Fisher Sr. Elementary School’s grade 3 students also made the top 3 in the Primary Vocal Category.
In all, there have been 12 entries over 6 years for the CBC Music Class Challenge– 6 have made top 10, three have made the top 3, and 2 have won first place.
Music Specialist David Arless has been at Saint John Fisher Senior for 9 years. His goal is to foster a love and passion for music through various performance and learning opportunities that make music more relevant and real for his students. The CBC Music Class Challenge is the perfect opportunity to start off the year and has become a Saint John Fisher tradition.
“The kids get so much confidence, and it brings them so much joy,” said Arless about the competition. “They know there are thousands of kids across Canada who are watching our video and thinking to themselves this is a strong music program in Pointe Claire, Quebec.”
Arless added that he’s also very proud that in the video you can see the students’ joy, and smiles as well as their level of comfort and confidence in their performance. Our students are really beginning to understand that hard work pays off!
“All these skills, such as confidence and the skill of playing these instruments are challenging and they can transfer these skills into anything they apply themselves to in life,” he said.
“The music program is about music but also brain development and transferable skills,” said Arless. “These students will do better in high school and in all of their subjects and go on to be confident members of society and excel at whatever they apply themselves to.”
At Saint John Fisher Senior all students in Grade 6 and some students in Grade 5 enjoy a fully funded concert band program as well as a host of extra-curricular music activities. The ultimate goal will be to have the concert band program span two years for all students in cycle 3.
He says music at St John Fisher is DEEP, a slogan the school has coined: “At SJF music is Deep”. Meaning that the music learned and created is profound and real and transcends the school walls, goes out in the world and comes back to them. This time it’s coming back in the form of more prize money to purchase instruments and two more gold record plaques to adorn the Deep Music trophy wall.
Congratulations SJFSr and Mr. David Arless for all of your hard work!
