Mulan's first solo travel

Last weekend, Mulan solo traveled for the first time ever.

On Friday afternoon she flew down to Wellington, stayed in a backpackers, then flew back up to Auckland on Sunday night.

This was because the concert band that she plays in (West City Youth Concert Band) was performing at the New Zealand Concert Bands Association National Festival, which this year was held in Wellington.

In Wellington, Mulan caught the bus from the airport to the backpackers, and then back again.  Once at the backpackers she was able to walk everywhere, as it was close to the performance hall and CBD.

At the backpackers, Mulan roomed in a 4-bed dorm, and she used the shared kitchen to cook her meals.  Frequent family travels over the years meant she was pretty familiar with buying what she needed from the supermarket to cook.  So, independent living went smoothly.

She said that on Saturday and Sunday morning she did lots of sightseeing walks around Wellington, clocking up a couple of dozen kilometres on her phone app.

Then on Sunday afternoon her band performed at the festival.

They played four pieces, which happily were recorded and posted on YouTube for us family back home to enjoy:

We can see Mulan at the front centre, playing the flute.

Delightfully, the band was awarded Gold by the festival adjudicators.  Well done everyone!

It sounds like she had lots of fun, and this may be the first of many more travel adventures.

Music

Alongside athletics, Mulan and Miya are equally involved in music.  Here's what they've been doing:

Mulan:

Last year (2024) Mulan was very involved with music at her school (Westlake Girls High School).  The Westlake schools (both girls and boys) have an excellent music programme, and are especially active in the large group orchestras, bands and choirs.

Mulan played cello in the Westlake Symphony Orchestra and Westlake Chamber Orchestra, and also sang in the Cigno Voce choir.  Mid year, they performed at the KBB Festival and Big Sing events.  Her string quartet performed at the Chamber Music Contest.

Through Westlake, Mulan had weekly lessons in both cello and singing.  She joined two weekend school music camps, for choir and orchestra.

She also played flute in the West City Youth Concert Band, and performed at the New Zealand Concert Bands Association Nationals in Hamilton.

But her main instrument continues to be the recorder, which she had private lessons in throughout the year.

Mulan took music as a Year 13 subject, and sat NCEA 3 Music, achieving excellence.

She also sat Music Scholarship, which involved her performing on the recorder and writing a 3000-word essay analysing the piece she played.  Scholarship is tough to get, and in 2024 of the 2088 New Zealand students who sat it in music, only 60 got scholarship plus 6 got outstanding (stats here).

Delightfully, Mulan got Music Scholarship (and $500 for her efforts)!

This year (2025) Mulan has stepped back a bit with her music, to focus on her university studies.

However, she continues to play flute in the West City Youth Concert Band.  The National Festival this year will be in July in Wellington.  This will be Mulan's first big independent trip, flying down and staying in a backpackers for the weekend.

This year Mulan has also started a part-time student job, teaching recorder at Birkdale North Music Centre.  On Saturday mornings, Mulan teaches five classes of beginner recorder to primary-aged children.

Miya:

Last year Miya started at Westlake Girls High School, and immediately got involved in lots of music groups.

She was in the Year 9 Music Academy subject class.  She newly picked up the French horn, and had weekly lessons in that and also clarinet.

She auditioned for and was selected into the senior Westlake Concert Band, playing clarinet.  She also played in the junior Symphonic Band.  She performed at the KBB Festival, and attended two weekend school music camps.

Miya also played clarinet in the West City Youth Concert Band, and performed at the Nationals.

This year, Miya is doing even more music at Westlake.

She is in four groups -- Westlake Symphony Orchestra, Westlake Concert Band, Westlake Symphonic Band, and Nota Bella choir.  She's having lessons in clarinet, French horn and singing.  Again, she's taking music as one of her subject options.  And again, she went away on a weekend music camp.

In the coming months Miya will perform at the Big Sing, KBB Festival, and the Chamber Music Contest.

With being so busy doing Westlake music, Miya decided to stop playing in the West City Band.

But the big exciting news for Miya is that Westlake is planning a music group trip to China in April of next year.  About 100 students across the four senior orchestra/bands will go to Beijing, Xi'an and Shanghai, performing and sightseeing.

Music

Here's another end-of-year summary.  This time for music.

Miya:

Miya's main instrument continues to be the clarinet.  For the second year she's played in the West City Youth Concert Band, and they had their final playout of the year last Saturday, playing at the Te Atatu Christmas Parade.

She's also been having private lessons and working towards her clarinet Grade 7 Trinity exam, which she sat on Thursday.  (UPDATE: Miya passed!!)

We're coming to the end of homeschooling, and Miya has enrolled to start at Westlake Girls High School at the beginning of next year, in Year 9.  Westlake emphasises music, and a few weeks ago they had their auditions for their 2024 orchestras and bands.  Miya had two auditions -- one at Westlake Boys High School for their senior combined schools Concert Band, and one at the Girls school for the girls' orchestras.

Happily, her auditions went well and they accepted her into the Westlake Concert Band.  Junior students who are in one of the senior groups are also required to be in a junior girls group, and Miya has been accepted into the Symphonic Band.  She's also signed up for the Year 9 Music Academy, which is the extension subject course.

Next year Miya will have private lessons for her clarinet through the school, and has also decided to try out the French horn, with lessons in that, too.  (If/when Miya does NCEA Music, it's good to have a second instrument.)

Miya's thinking she probably won't continue with the West City band next year, as she's going to be pretty busy with everything else.

Mulan:

This year Mulan also played in the West City Youth Concert Band, playing her third instrument, flute.

She played her second instrument, cello, in two Westlake school orchestras -- the Symphony Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra.  She also had private cello lessons through the school.

And she continues to have private lessons in her first instrument, recorder.

Mulan sat NCEA 2 Music this year, and achieved excellence in all her music internal assessments.  She's now finished her exams, and we're awaiting the results.

Next year Mulan will do NCEA 3 Music, and again, after auditioning, has been accepted into the Symphony Orchestra and Chamber Orchestra.  She's also decided to join the Cigno Voce choir, and will have singing lessons.

We're also not sure if she'll continue with the West City band, as she'll also be pretty busy.

Music season

The last few weeks has been music season.

It's the time of the year for both the New Zealand Concert Bands Association Nationals and the KBB Music Festival.

Mulan and Miya's orchestras and bands have been preparing for these for months, and it was great to listen to them perform.  (Prior to the big events, we also got to hear them at preparation Gala performances.)

First up, Mulan and Miya are in the West City Youth Concert Band, which performed at the Concert Bands Nationals on Sunday the 6th.  Conveniently this year it was held just a few minutes walk from us at the Westlake Girls High School Event Centre (last year it was held at Waikato University in Hamilton).

(Mulan is amongst the flutes on the left, and Miya is with the clarinets on the right.)

It was livestreamed on YouTube, and you can still watch it (starts at 11 min):

Delightfully, they were awarded Gold for their performance.  Photos are here.

Then, last week was the KBB Festival.  This year Mulan played cello in two orchestras for her school, the Westlake Symphony Orchestra and the Westlake Chamber Orchestra.

Both orchestras played 30-minute sessions last Tuesday.  The best orchestras were then invited to play again at the Gala performances on Saturday.

Delightfully, both orchestras were asked to play at the Gala, and both were awarded Gold.

The photos are here.

UPDATE(25/8/2023): The latest Westlake Girls magazine issue gives the details.

Recorder and cello

Since Mulan's recorder performance a couple of months ago, we've enjoyed a few more music concerts.

On the 12th of May the Westlake schools' orchestras, bands and choirs performed at their Music of the Lake concert.  The school wrote about it here.

Mulan played her cello in both the symphony orchestra and the chamber orchestra (and you can just see her in one of the photos in the school article!).

Then on the 28th Mulan joined her recorder teacher and a few other musicians playing at a retirement village (and getting paid for her performance).

Here's Mulan's first piece, Benedetto Marcello's Sonata No. 4 for Recorder:

Her second piece, Kevin Kim's Cabbage Trio

And they finished off with an unplanned, sight-read piece:

Finally, last night the Westlake schools' choirs performed at their Choir Concert.  (The school wrote about it here, and we can just see Mulan in one of the photos.)

Mulan doesn't sing, but the Cigno Voce choir asked her to play her cello during one of their songs.

And here it is:

Handel's Athaliah

The other day I mentioned that Mulan was going to play her recorder in a concert.

It happened over the weekend.

So, Mulan's teacher, Kevin Kim, is a professional recorder player.  He asked Mulan if she would like to play second recorder in Handel's Athaliah, in which he was playing first recorder.

Oh, and Mulan would get paid for it.

Of course we said yes!

Mulan attended a couple of practices last week, and then performed twice over the weekend.  (I went to the Auckland Central performance.)

Mulan just had a small part, playing in one piece (number 26 of 57).  When it was time, Mulan and Kevin stood up and played together, featuring back and forth with the singer playing Josabeth.

Well done Mulan on her first professional music performance!

Music

In yesterday's post I briefly mentioned about Mulan's music.  Here's a bit more.

Mulan:

Mulan's in three orchestras/bands this year.  She

• continues to play flute in the West City Youth Concert Band,
• continues to play cello in the Westlake Symphony Orchestra,
• and has newly joined the Westlake Chamber Orchestra, also playing cello.

A couple of weeks ago the Westlake music groups performed at their annual Equinox Concert.  The Westlake Girls magazine wrote about it here.

Here's my shaky video of the Chamber Orchestra:

And the Symphony Orchestra:

Last weekend the Westlake Symphony Orchestra and Concert Band went away together for a four-day camp.  (Unfortunately it clashed with Mulan's athletics North Island competition, which I mentioned here.)  From what I hear there were a lot of hours of music, and not so many of sleep.  A good time, though exhausting, and awful timing just before their NCEA internal assessments this week.  The Westlake Girls magazine wrote about it here (Mulan is in one of the photos -- holding up the picture).

As part of playing cello in the school orchestras, Mulan is continuing to have weekly private cello lessons at school.

Even though Mulan plays cello and flute in the orchestras/band, recorder continues to be her main instrument, and she is continuing to have weekly private lessons at home.

Mulan has been asked to play recorder in a concert next weekend, playing Handel's Athaliah (tickets for Saturday and Sunday).

Miya:

Miya continues to play her clarinet in the West City Youth Concert Band.

She is continuing to have fortnightly private lessons, and is working towards sitting the Trinity Grade 7 exam at the end of the year.  (Miya's teacher thought that after sitting Grade 5 last year she may as well skip Grade 6 and go directly to Grade 7.)

West City Band Camp

Back in January, Mulan and Miya joined the West City Youth Concert Band Camp.  (Same as last year.)  This was four full days of music, ending in a performance on the Friday evening.  

Unfortunately I had Covid at the time, so I didn't get to be there, but the concert is now up on YouTube for us all to enjoy.

Mulan's NCEA results

The NCEA school exam results came through a few days ago.  We looked eagerly at Mulan's numbers.

And well done her!

As always, as with any on-the-day performance, be it athletics, music, dance or academics, there were some bits where Mulan performed smoothly, while other bits were a little under what we know she can sometimes do.  It's a snapshot in time, not an overall judgement.  Important, interesting and useful, but only in its context.

Having said that, overall it was a very satisfying result and something to be proud of.  I think it appropriately reflects what Mulan put into it -- her time, effort, seriousness, diligence, and, most importantly, investment-balance with the various other life areas in which Mulan is involved.  She put time and effort into her academic studies, but it didn't take over from also equally putting time and effort into her dance, music and athletics, to also achieve well in those.

So, Mulan passed NCEA 1 with excellence endorsement.

She got excellence endorsements in Maths, Science and Music, while she got merit endorsements in English, Accounting and PE.

She passed all 121 credits she sat, with 79 at excellence level and 42 at merit level.

Along with doing NCEA level 1, in her extension English class she sat a level 2 unit.  We were delighted that she passed this with merit, as in some of her earlier practices she hadn't done quite so well.

On the other hand, she didn't do quite so well in one of her Accounting units, getting merit rather than excellence.  Even though the rest of her Accounting was all excellence, with the bad luck of the points calculation system this dropped her down to merit endorsement overall in Accounting.  A little sad after she did so well in her school Accounting results, but that's the idiosyncratic nature of on-the-day performances.

Well done Mulan.  Super proud of her!

Music exam

We just got the result of Miya's music exam.

This year Miya has been working towards her Grade 5 Trinity clarinet exam, and two weeks ago she sat it.  It was her first ever music exam (and first ever in our family) so it was a new experience for us all.

The result came in the post, and we were delighted with her mark of 84 (out of 100), which earned her Merit.  (Merit is 75-86, and Distinction is 87+.)

Congratulations Miya!

Music and athletics

Saturday was quite busy.

First up, at 8:30am we were in Te Atatu for the Christmas Parade.

West City Youth Concert Band, which Mulan and Miya play in, set up in the park to entertain the crowds.  They played one-hour-ish sessions both before and after the parade.

(Mulan's in the flute section on the near side, while Miya is on the far side with the clarinets.)

When it finished at 1pm we headed off to Pakuranga for our usual McKinnon Shield interclub athletics competition.  The results are here.

For our first event, Mulan and Miya were in the same 80m hurdles race together.  Into a strong head wind they both had pleasing times, with Mulan getting 15.05sec and Miya getting a PB of 16.70sec.

I pushed myself with a 60m sprint (8.64sec) quickly followed by a 100m sprint (13.81sec).

We all then finished off with a triple jump together.

Delightfully, Miya got a new PB of 9.02m while Mulan got a solid 9.41m (again into a head wind).  These were good enough to get both Mulan and Miya onto the Auckland ranking lists (they are now on the ranking lists for two events each!).  Still recovering from my sprints, I only managed 9.60m.

(At the same time Mulan's two-year-old Under 14 Auckland record of 9.32m was finally beaten; the new record 9.67m could be a challenge for Miya to beat!)

It must have all been too much for me.  Arriving home around 6:30pm I had a migraine, which put me out of action for the next 36 hours.

School music and PE

This year Mulan is doing Year 11 Music at school, and is sitting NCEA 1.

Along with music theory and history there is also a practical component, where the students prepare and perform pieces, which are assessed.  One assessment is a group performance, while another is solo.

The school does not tell students which instrument to use, or which pieces to play.  The students choose the instruments they are personally most skilled at, and over a number of weeks practice and polish their pieces both in and out of class (and often with their private teachers).

In other words, one aim of Music at school is to assess the students' specialist areas at their best.

What would school Music be like if, instead of this, the students' practical component was assessed by looking at how well they learnt a new instrument they'd never played before?  What if the school chose the instrument that all students were required to play (intentionally choosing a more obscure instrument that likely no one has played before), gave the students a few weeks of in-class lessons, then evaluated their performance playing that new instrument?

This year Mulan is also doing Year 11 PE at school, and is sitting NCEA 1.

Similar to Music, PE in school has both a theory and practical component.  (Although one difference is that the theory component of PE is entirely internally assessed, whereas Music has some external assessments.)

This year Mulan's school has decided to assess all Year 11 PE students on both gymnastics and handball.  Students do not choose the sport they are assessed in.

Last term Mulan's class went out of school to have gymnastics lessons at North Harbour Gymnastics.  During class they prepared routines, which they then performed for assessment.  Some students had never done gymnastics before, and so the lessons and routines were fairly beginner level.  Mulan was lucky** that for a few years and up until about a year ago she'd casually learnt gymnastics.  Consequently, Mulan found the required gymnastics skills both familiar and easy, and she comfortably achieved excellence on that assessment.  (**Or was Mulan unlucky that those school lessons were a bit of a waste of time for her?!)

This term the students will be introduced to handball, an Olympic sport that's popular in Europe but almost unheard of here in New Zealand.  Mulan's PE teacher told us that this sport was intentionally chosen as likely none of the students have done it before.  Teachers will observe and assess the students as they learn this unfamiliar sport, getting to know the rules of the game and acquiring the basic skills.  As part of the assessment students will also need to reflect on their learning experience.

What would school PE be like if, instead of this, the students were assessed in sports that they were most skilled at?  What if the students chose their own sport, worked on polishing their skills, and then were observed and assessed performing at their specialist best?

Why is it that at school Music is seen as a subject in which students are encouraged to perform as skillfully as possible in their chosen specialist area, whereas in PE one is assessed more on one's learning attitude, reflections and teamwork spirit?

KBB festival

The KBB Music Festival is happening all this week, where school orchestras and bands perform and compete.

Yesterday Mulan was there with her school orchestra, so the rest of us family went along to sit in the audience and enjoy the music.

Mulan was involved in three 30-minute sessions:

First up, Westlake entered the non-competition Pupuke Pops Players.  This was then followed by a huge multi-school play-in.

Then after lunch the Westlake Symphony Orchestra did their competition pieces.

(Mulan is front-right with her cello.)

The final Gala event is this Saturday, where the best four bands in each category (symphony orchestra, chamber orchestra, concert band and jazz band) play again.  We've bought tickets for the evening show, as WSO will be playing.

Music season

Suddenly it's music season, and we've got a busy several days.

First up, last Sunday Mulan and Miya played in the West City Youth Concert Band, at their Unveiled show (I wrote about it here).

Then on Friday night Westlake Girls and Boys schools put on a combined Gala show with all their music groups performing.  With so many groups the show was over five hours long, and split into two sessions.  Mulan, playing her cello in the Westlake Symphony Orchestra, performed last, which meant that she didn't get home until after 10:30pm.

Mama bought a ticket to watch the show, but Miya and I stayed home.  No, it's not because we don't care about Mulan.  It was just that we wanted to sleep, because ...

Yesterday (Saturday) morning we had to leave home at 6am to drive to Hamilton.  The New Zealand Concert Bands Association are having their Nationals competition this weekend at Waikato University, and West City Youth Concert Band had their 30 minute slot at 9am.  The livestream worked, and you can watch their performance 39 minutes into it here.  Mulan's on the left playing her flute while Miya's on the right playing her clarinet.

After lunch, at 1pm the Band had a 40-minute workshop, where they got some tips on how to make it sound even better.

Looking ahead, on Tuesday Mulan is back with her school orchestra, playing at the KBB music festival.  As the Pupuke Pops Players they are performing at 11:30am, and then as the Westlake Symphony Orchestra they are on at 2:30pm.

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Meanwhile, dance is still continuing.  Today Mulan has over six hours of ballet, while Miya has two.  On Friday Mulan will sit her RAD Advanced 1 ballet exam.

West City Band concert

Mama and I enjoyed a date without the children yesterday.

We started with a pleasant nature walk around Te Atatu Peninsula,

and then followed that up with a concert in the evening.

West City Band performed their Unveiled show, and it was thoroughly enjoyable.  First up, their Youth Concert Band performed four pieces, then their String Orchestra performed three, and finally their Concert Band played one piece.  The concert programme is here.

Relatedly, there were a couple of familiar faces in the Youth Band.  Mulan was playing her flute, while Miya played her clarinet.  (We'd dropped them off a few hours before the show.)

If you missed it, they're playing again this Saturday (6th) in Hamilton.  If you can't be there, then check out the livestream.  The Youth Band (with Mulan and Miya) will be playing at 9am.

Music and climbing

Unfortunately we couldn't be at multiple places at once last Saturday.

The place we chose to be at was a music camp for West City Youth Concert Band.

Both Mulan (flute) and Miya (clarinet) are in the band, and they have weekly practices.  But with two upcoming public performances (a concert on the 31st, and then the nationals in Hamilton in a month) they needed a full weekend camp to polish up the pieces.

At the end of the camp on Sunday us parents enjoyed a sneak-preview pre-concert performance.  To my inexpert ears it's sounding pretty good.

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The other place we wanted to be at, but couldn't attend, was the annual Boulder Bash rock climbing competition at Northern Rocks (which Miya did last year).

The rules of the comp is that everyone has a couple of hours to climb as much as they want.  Each climb is worth points (more difficult climbs = more points), and we add up our best eight climbs.  There are three levels of competition -- Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced.

So today at our usual climbing session Miya and I did a bit of calculating to see how we would have done based on the results just published.

I pushed myself with a pseudo-comp, and my eight best climbs today added up to 252 points.  This would have placed me about three quarters of the way down the Intermediate Men ranking list.

Miya videoed me on eight greens today; here's a couple:

Miya was working on polishing climbs today, and she didn't try to do a pseudo-comp.  But she added up her best climbs she has completed recently, to give her an idealised score of 326 points.  This likely would have got her into the finals (top six) of the Intermediate Women section.  (And considering that there were only six women competing at the Advanced level, that's pretty impressive!)

Here's Miya on another yellow today:

We're really hoping there are no clashes next year, and that we both get to compete at Boulder Bash 2023.

Music

Sunday was about the music.

In the morning Mulan had her usual recorder lesson.

We followed this up with a very enjoyable two-hour concert at the beautiful St Matthew-In-The-City church, listening to the St Matthew's Chamber Orchestra.

Miya's clarinet teacher, Brendan Dalton, plays clarinet in the orchestra, and suggested we come along.  It was definitely worth it!

In the evening, Mulan recorded herself playing one of her latest recorder pieces.  Last week we learnt that her school is having a soloist competition, and video audition submissions were due by end-of-day Sunday.

School camps

Mulan's been busy with school camps this past week.

First up, after the music concert last Thursday the orchestra had a camp on Friday through to Sunday.

Pre-Covid, in previous years this was a real camp, going away together for two nights.  But in Covid times they couldn't sleep over, so the camp was just long daytime practices in the school "Event Centre" (AKA hall).

Over the three days it added up to 15.5 hours together, and especially on Saturday Mulan said for the final hour or so their brains were too tired to count the beats.

But overall it sounds like it was a fun and productive weekend.

It was in the school newsletter here (see if you can spot Mulan amongst the cellos).

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On Sunday, Mulan had just a few hours to pack for her second school camp, and this one was a real going-away activity.

This was a compulsory three-day Year 11 PE camp, with NCEA 1 credits on offer.  So apparently they were allowed to be Covid-riskier.

On Monday, Mulan had to be at school at 8am, with packed bags, for the 80-minute bus drive up north to Mangawhai.

Since school is just a five-minute walk away from home, the family walked with her to say goodbye.  As Mama and I stood watching Mulan walk into the gym with her bags, a passing teacher pointedly joked that likely Mulan wouldn't even miss us.  While obviously true, it was also irrelevant to why we were there.

Apart from a brief phone call on Monday evening (from a teacher's phone), we didn't hear anything until Mulan walked in the door at 2pm on Wednesday, slightly stiff from the different-from-usual activities but otherwise good.

The camp was exactly Mulan's style, and she had a great time.  It was at the beach, and they spent a lot of the time in the water surfing, stand-up paddleboarding and kayaking.  They did a short (1 hour) hike, and they had plenty of fun camp activities in their cabins.

Back in school they'll be doing some post-camp written reflections.

Once again, we commented on the school's authoritarianism.  Mobile phones were compulsorily taken away from the girls for the duration of the camp.  (In contrast, at Mulan's club athletics camp last year it was only at team meetings that phones were not allowed.  Kids were trusted to be responsible and self-manage.)

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Fortunately, the school North Island athletics champs, which were planned for the same weekend, were cancelled this year because of Covid.  Otherwise, Mulan would have had a tough decision about a third school camp on offer.

Westlake Equinox Concert

Tonight we were at Westlake Boys High School for the Equinox Concert.

Ten music groups performed, including the Westlake Symphony Orchestra.  Here they are, playing Franz von Suppé's Light Cavalry Overture:

There's a very good reason why the cameraperson focused mostly on the cellos.  I was the cameraperson, and Mulan is playing her cello -- she's the one with the blue mask.

It was in the school newsletter here.

Music education

Here's an update about what the girls are doing for their music:

So, in January Mulan and Miya attended the West City Youth Concert Band Camp.  It was so much fun that we asked about the girls joining the band itself.

The answer was yes, and the first band practice of the year was on Monday evening.  We'll go every week, and there'll be playouts throughout the year.  Mulan plays her flute, while Miya plays her clarinet.

Miya has fortnightly private clarinet lessons, and is preparing for the Grade 5 exam later in the year.  For now she has dropped her other instruments (trumpet, saxophone, keyboard, violin, recorder) to focus on clarinet.

Mulan has also joined the Westlake Symphony Orchestra, playing cello.  This is the main Westlake school orchestra, and combines both the boys and girls schools.  They also practice once a week and will have a camp and performances/competitions during the year.

We weren't planning that Mulan would join this orchestra.  But when Mulan asked about the other school orchestras/bands, she found that this year their practices all clash with her other scheduled activities.  Fortunately this orchestra practices during one of Mulan's few timetable gaps, and they were in need of more cellos.  So they invited her to come along.

Suddenly, we were overwhelmed with emails to read and Google forms to sign.  It's all taken very seriously by the school, and we're required to sign that Mulan will follow their rules, promising in writing that she will be there for every session throughout the year.

Prior to joining the orchestra, Mulan had signed up to her usual swimming lessons at NZL Swim.  The orchestra practice just squeezes in before the swimming lessons.  Since the orchestra is from 3:30pm to 5:15pm (and the swimming lesson starts at 5:30pm), it would be ideal if Mulan could leave orchestra practice five minutes early to get to swimming.

We thought Mulan may as well ask the orchestra leaders if she could leave early.  Before asking, Mulan observed to me that if it was any other activity it would be no problem, but being school ...

Sure enough, the orchestra leaders declined to allow Mulan to leave early.  For the past couple of weeks Mulan has been jumping into the pool a few minutes after the swim lesson has started.  (She then leaves swimming early to get to dance lessons.)

As a requirement of joining this orchestra, Mulan also has weekly private cello lessons during school hours.  At today's lesson the teacher raised the idea of Mulan sitting the Grade 6 exam this year.

Despite playing both flute and cello in these groups, up until now we've still treated the recorder as Mulan's number one music instrument.  For now she is continuing with her private recorder lessons every fortnight with Kevin Kim.  Mulan is now at the playing level where Kevin is recommending that Mulan practice every day with, at least, a few longer sessions of 45 minutes and the other sessions about 15 minutes.  We're a little concerned that there are not enough hours in the day for Mulan to fit everything in; it would be a shame to stop the recorder, but Mulan does need to think seriously about her activities and timetabling if she is not able to put the time into practicing.

Finally, Mulan is sitting NCEA 1 Music this year at school.  I think I am right to say that there are eight girls in this class.  Delightfully, four of them have joined together to form a string quartet for some of their assessment work.  A couple weekends ago the four met at our home (with one of the girls' private teachers) for a practice session.  It's sounding really nice and very promising.

Currently, two or three times a week I'm walking with Mulan to and from school, carrying her cello while she carries her bag and computer.  I'm not sure what we would've done if we had lived more that the 5-10min walk from school.

Yesterday, I asked Mulan to compare and contrast West City Youth Concert Band and Westlake Symphony Orchestra.

She said the Concert Band is more fun, with an interactive jokiness amongst everyone.  There's a different atmosphere in the school Orchestra; while the conductor makes jokes, the musicians don't.

My opinionated interpretation to date: this is typical school subtle authoritarianism in action.  While I have no doubt the school orchestra is excellent, and Mulan will learn lot, I suspect there is an added unnecessary layer of teacheryness to the proceedings, which long-term may possibly reduce the inspiration and self-motivation levels of the learners.