St James Cavalier Centre for Creativity (SJCC) Spazju Kreattiv Wednesday November 25th Day Rehearsals Thursday November 26th Performances. This was our most ambitious-ever Commonwealth project. 53 short pieces were commissioned, each representing one of the Commonwealth countries, and each featuring either the flute, the harp or both. Other instruments were also included. Edward Longstaff’s beautiful, evocative, semi-improvised piece PANORPHEUS was performed at the beginning and the end of the event in SJCC’s wonderfully spacious atrium, with musicians placed at many different levels.

• Concert 1 – PANORPHEUS in Africa (performed by Chethams School of Music)
• Concert 2 – PANORPHEUS in the South Pacific (performed by the Purcell School for Young Musicians)
• Concert 3 – PANORPHEUS in Asia (Performed by the Royal Over-Seas League)
• Concert 4 – PANORPHEUS in the Caribbean (Performed by a special Caribbean ensemble)
• Concert 5 – PANORPHEUS in Europe (Performed by musicians from the UK and Malta)

Huge thanks in particular to two wonderful musicians – Juliana Myslov (harp, ROSL and Royal College of Music) and Laura Davies (flute (Royal Academy of Music) who performed in all 5 concerts. As well as the concerts, young musicians from Chethams and Purcell ran lively interactive workshops designed by themselves for children in Malta and the UK, based on interesting material from different Commonwealth regions. It was unfortunate that a national security risk prevented three Maltese schools from attending these fascinating workshops. The children from other organisations who attended enjoyed the workshops greatly.

The performance venue, St James Cavalier Centre for Creativity – was ideal for the event, and SJCC staff were enormously helpful and kind to us all – especially Maria Spiteri Zahra and Toni Sant. However, it was such a shame that so few Maltese schools and members of the public came to hear this unique musical event, which had been created over 18 months specially for Malta and CHOGM 2015. HOWEVER – everyone was very glad to welcome the Apollo Youth Choir, the Bermonsey Harris Academy and the Commonwealth Festival Choir, who came to take part in the event along with composers from Canada, India and Malta who had written pieces to represent their own countries. PANORPHEUS will be performed again – in parts and as a whole.

The second performance of ‘PANORPHEUS in the South Pacific’ took place in the United Kingdom on Tuesday 27th January at The Purcell School, Aldenham Road, Bushey, Hertfordshire WD232TS. Other performances will take place in due course. http://www.edwardlongstaff.com/clips.html This beautiful, semi-improvised piece composed by Edward Longstaff, included flutes, harps and a large number of other musicians too. It was performed as a ‘framework’ at the beginning and end of the event.

Particular thanks to Christine Gangelhoff from The Bahamas, the Co-Director of PANORPHEUS, who took such an active interest in the project in the developmental stages and helped secure all the composers for PANORPHEUS in the Caribbean! These pieces were performed by Christine herself, an excellent flautist, plus others, including Sowah Mensah, a highly distinguished musician from Ghana and Rowland Sutherland, a brilliant flautist originating from St Vincent and the Grenadines. These delightful pieces were amongst the highlights of the whole event.