St Mary's Church, Dymock

Reports

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Ann Cam Primary School comes into church at the end of each term for their award ceremony and Service. 17th July saw the end of the school year so this time there were 15 pupils leaving from year 6 to go on to Secondary Education. (Return to top)

The service began with the award of merit certificates and badges to pupils from each year who had made notable progress in various ways, not just academic attainment. Year 4 demonstrated some model floats they'd made in their Technology Class for an imaginary carnival procession, each with battery powered motion, we sang the favourite hymn chosen by the boys and by the girls and 'hoodies' were presented to the 15 leavers in a colour of their own choice. (Return to top)

Presentation of flowers was made to each of the teachers and headmaster by the pupils as a thank-you for their work, and a silver salver presented to the boy and girl who had won the 'citizen of the year' award for their general helpful attitude. As the Service came to a close, we sang 'One more step along the way I go' and the Leavers symbolically left the church as the prayer 'A Gaelic Blessing' was read before returning to join everyone else to laugh at projected pictures of themselves from babies to today. (Return to top)

Every year in July our Family Service takes the form of a 'Songs of Praise' in which members of the congregation tell us why they chose their favourite hymn before we all join in to sing it, and this year was no exception. (Return to top)

Hymns chosen by 3 adults and 3 children included 'Praise to the Holiest in the Height' because they'd regularly played it on the piano as a small child; 'I The Lord of Sea and Sky' which is popular at Ann Cam School, and Jerusalem from memories of attending Women's Institute meetings in London. (Return to top)

A week after the professional Carducci String Quartet (see report below) our own local talent had a chance to show what they can do with a concert entitled 'Summer Serenade'. The Church Choir (known as 'St Mary's Singers' for these events) started the proceedings with 4 British Folks Songs before our young people performed a number of solo or group presentations on various instruments and human voice in a wide range of music styles from the classical and sacred, via swing and jazz, to musical theatre. (Return to top)

Though young teenagers, that didn't stop them performing advanced classics such as Brahms Hungarian Rhapsody on the violin, Tchaikovsky and Chopin on the piano and Duke Ellington's signature piece, It don't mean a Thing If It Ain't Got swing - all to a very high standard. They all joined together at the end to render John Rutter's 'A Gaelic Blessing'. (Return to top)

Friday 3rd July saw a welcome return to Dymock Church of the internationally famous Carducci String Quartet, a professional group of musicians who regularly perform in prestigious places such as London, New York and Dublin as well as issuing several well-thought of recordings. (Return to top)

Their programme this time included Shostakovich quartet No 3, Mendelson quartet op 80 and Hayden's 'joke' quartet, which had an unplanned 'joke' as part way through the second moment part of the main church lighting at the front of the nave decided to fizzle and explode. They carried on manly for a while but when it started to smell, proceedings were halted for a while whilst it was sorted out. An electrician will be coming to investigate next week! (Return to top)

Never-the less, the concert was deemed a success as it was much appreciated by the large audience. (Return to top)