Fifth birthday sounds celebratory note for Coole Music

NEXT weekend, a South Galway institution celebrates its fifth year bringing music into the lives of young people in the area.

In September 2005, a new musical entity was born in Gort, dedicated to making music education available to the community of South Galway. With its name inspired by the beauty and nature of Coole Park, Coole Music is now a vibrant and successful not-for-profit music school offering a wide range of instruments and musical activities for all in the South Galway and North Clare area.
Coole Music is operated as a non-profit, community organisation and is governed by a very active parents’ committee. Its musical director is Katharina Baker, originally from Germany, who came to the area eight years ago with her young family.
For Katharina, starting the school was worth the effort and she received strong support from others.
“Some people did think I was mad but in the beginning, I don’t think people realised it was not for profit because we have to charge fees to pay the teachers. Most people thought we had funding to do it but we didn’t. A lot of people don’t realise that there is an awful lot of voluntary work happening to keep the school in existence. When people got interested in it and asked about it, they found out that it was mostly voluntary and I think they were surprised by that,” she recalls.
While some voluntary organisations struggle to get parents involved, this was not a problem for Coole Music according to Katharina.
“We had a great support system from the start from a core group of great people. Before I started the school, I was teaching music privately and had a choir so I already had a network of people around Gort who were interested in music and they helped us to start,” she remembers.
The school has grown steadily. Three years ago Fiona Buckley took on the role of administrator and co-director and Coole Music now has approximately 200 students.
“One real highlight for me over the past five years has been the growth of the orchestra. To see it grow so quickly from a tiny group to a 45-person orchestra with a very mature sound and then I would say the highlight of the five years for that group was travelling to Germany and doing two concerts there last year,” outlines Katharina.
“I never thought it would grow so much so quickly. I hadn’t expected it to grow so fast that we would now be at a stage where we could present an orchestra of this quality in just five years. That is really amazing. One thing that has helped bring us forward, I think, is that we work really closely with all the teachers. We hold a teachers’ inspiration day during the summer and a teachers’ seminar and workshop and lecture at the end of September. That is something we have done from the very start. Now we have a teachers’ ensemble with 14 teachers and they will perform as part of the anniversary concert,” she continues.
Working from Gort Community School, Coole Music offers tuition in violin, viola, cello, double bass, recorder, flute, clarinet, saxophone, trumpet, piano, percussion, guitar as well as singing in the children’s choir Coole Kidz.
This young choir has mostly become known for their beautiful St Lucia Concerts in Scandinavian Style around Christmas time. They have performed in St Nicholas’, Galway, St Colman’s, Kinvara, the Old Church of Ireland in Gort and are invited to take the St Lucia Performance to Kilkenny.
Next year, Coole Kidz will participate in the Peace Proms joint concert with 500 singers and the Cross Border Orchestra of Ireland, at Leisureland, Galway. Further plans include travelling to Cork for a performance at the Cork Choral Festival in April. This choir is open to members of Coole Music between eight and 13 years old.
Since 2010, the choir has been under direction of Noreen McDermott, who also just has taken on the baton for the new Coole Junior Orchestra which held its first rehearsal on September 30 with 23 members.
Members of Coole Music have performed at numerous events over the past five years and added a rich musical backdrop to many local occasions. The school has played at the Lady Gregory Autumn Gathering and launches of the Winter and Spring Education Programmes at Coole Park, the County Galway Arts Awards Ceremony, as well as the Mountshannon, Tuam and Salthill Arts Festivals. Two of its young chamber music groups performed in the National Concert Hall in Dublin in February 2010 and Coole Music Youth Orchestra will represent Gort at the National Concert Hall in February, 2011 as part of the IAYO Festival of Youth Orchestras.
Classical music is the main teaching focus in the school and there are seven string teachers to support the number of students currently enrolled. Chamber Music groups are a very popular feature of the school and this year, there are nine young trios and quartets who regularly play music together.
In 2009, the school started to develop its wind section and now has four wind teachers who are also focused on ensemble playing and facilitating the students playing together. Other classes offered at Coole Music include Toddler Tunes, Music Macaroni, Playful Percussion and the Fiddle Fun Programme which has become a very popular introductory class for children starting a string instrument.
“The youngest children we take in would be from about six months old. They take part in Toddler Tunes. Then for three-year-olds, we have Music Macaroni. There is Playful Percussion for age four and then fiddle fun that starts at five. The children are in there from the beginning really but instrument teaching doesn’t really begin until they are about five years of age. Everything before that is just preparational music,” Katharina explains.
Coole Music is holding a fifth anniversary celebration concert at the Lady Gregory Hotel in Gort on Sunday, October 17.
Beginning with a pre-concert reception in the reading room from 3.15pm, the concert begins at 4pm.
The line-up includes the Ebony Wind Quintet from Dublin, the Yukatope String Quartet, the Coole Kidz Choir, Coole Music Teachers’ Ensemble, the Shanwalla Sextet and, of course, the Coole Music Youth Orchestra.
The event will be introduced by Marilyn Gaughan, arts officer with Galway County Council, and will include the launch of the school’s 2011 calendar, and a photographic exhibition.
Tickets to the celebration concert are available at Coole Properties, Gort and also via email at info@coole-music.com.