What Katy Did Next

On Thursday we went to a percussion recital given by my niece Katy Hebditch at Millfield School. She is in her last year there and is going off to Imperial College to study geology and geophysics and take up a scholarship at the Royal College of Music that is handily next door. We were not prepared for the splendour of the school and the fantastic concert hall. There were lots of Hebditch relatives in the audience, Aunt Marjorie, who has just turned 90, and Uncle John and Chris Willey, my father’s cousin, who I haven’t seen for years, so there was a bit of a reunion as well. My cousin Sally told me that I had to organise a big reunion of all the cousins – we are a productive lot!

It was a great programme, on the marimba, Katy’s favourite instrument, the vibraphone, the snare drum and then all sorts of odd percussion stuff the most outstanding of which was a very heavy gong sat in a box of water which she hit and moved up and down in the water making the most astonishing sound. I loved Divertimento by Akira Yuyama which was a marimba saxophone piece with six stick marimba playing – that’s three sticks in each hand. This was very jazzy, it was hard not to bop. The March-Cadenza for Snare Drum by Gert Mortensen was terrific and I was very intrigued by Mundus Canis by George Crumb. It is scored for guitar and percussion and is about the various dogs in his life including the very naughty Yoda and Katy had to shout Yoda, Bad Dog. The concert hall was almost full and we all loved it and forced her to play an encore which was Little Prayer. This piece was criticised by the judges in the BBC Young Musician of the Year for being a little sentimental and it is a bit of a tear jerker but very beautiful nonetheless.

Then various teachers including Jeremy Little who has taught Katy for ever and is a lovely, very huggable person, and the rest of us went out to dinner, hosted by proud Mum and Dad William and Liz, to the Old Spot in Wells. We became very confused by the one way system but made it in the end. Here is Katy, Jeremy on the left and the boyfriend on the right.