Coffee-break interview: Amy Powell
In our school newsletters we will be hearing from different freelancers and teachers to find out a little bit more about them and their experiences with ENO Engage.
As we gear up for the biggest year of Finish This… yet, in this edition, we sat down with ENO Engage Programme Manager Amy Powell for her take on the project.
Hi Amy! Can you start by introducing yourself and telling us a bit about your role at the ENO?
I’m Amy Powell, and I’m the Schools Programme Manager for ENO Engage. I’ve worked with the ENO for the past four years, and I oversee the programming and management of our school projects and workshop and performance opportunities, including our flagship music making programme Finish This…, our school membership scheme, Discover Opera Days, school ticket nights at the London Coliseum and CPD workshops. It’s a busy and varied programme, and a complete joy working closely with freelance artists, music hubs, teachers and education consultants.
Can you tell us a bit about Finish This… – what is it, and how would you describe it to someone who hasn’t heard of it before?
Finish This… is a creative and inclusive music making project that is delivered by teachers with support from the ENO who provide you with a suite of digital films, toolkit resources, and teacher training. Available to all state schools for free, nationwide. We invite students to step into the role of an ENO composer; to listen, respond and resolve a purposefully unfinished piece of operatic work, in whatever way they are inspired to! The project offers three learner pathways – Primary KS2, Secondary KS3 and SEND learners, including those with profound and multiple learning difficulties – which means the composition journey is fully tailored to suit a range of learner ages and needs, and different school curriculums, but the starting point (the operatic piece Blue, Red, Yellow…. by Omar Shahryar) and the end point (creating your own colour world to finish the piece) is the same across all pathways.
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And how did Finish This… first come about?
This idea of how we might inspire students to finish an unfinished composition was initially sparked by the ENO’s performance of Mozart’s Requiem – a piece famously left unfinished due to Mozart’s untimely death, and subsequently completed by his students. Our ENO Chorus and Orchestra performed Mozart’s Requiem in November 2020 at the London Coliseum for a BBC 2 broadcast. It made us want to further explore this idea of artists responding to and finishing another artist’s piece of creative work, and how they might go about this. In addition, we knew we wanted to create an inspiring and effective music making project for schools. When we first started developing the project concept, our wonderful composer Omar Shahryar shared with us a beautiful quote, highlighting the importance of making music yourself, to really learn and understand what music is. This quote has also been a real driving factor to the development of this project:
“…a place cannot come to life musically until the inhabitants perform their own music. Moreover, there can be no real understanding of music without creating it. Can one imagine teaching art without ever encouraging children to draw, paint and make sculptures?” – Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
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What would you say makes Finish This… unique?
Hmm… a couple of things I’d say. Firstly, opera music isn’t always something students might come across in day-to-day life, and the use of film, colour and animation to present the operatic work is fun and surprising, and not often something you think of when you first think of opera. Secondly, the co-creation nature of this project. We’ve worked closely with schools and teachers, as well as our creative learning consultants, to really ensure the scheme of work and resources are accessible to a variety of schools, and both specialists and non-specialists, and to ensure they are effective in the classroom, within different school settings.
What is your favourite thing about Finish This… ?
There are too many favourite things to choose from! The musical responses from the students are so incredibly creative and striking – so many inventive ways to create this new sound world of a colour of their choice. But the process is absolutely key too: seeing the students embrace the composer role and find their own connection with opera and composition has been amazing to watch. Plus of course, working with a fantastic cohort of teachers who worked closely with us to develop the schemes of work and resources to ensure everything was useful, meaningful and fit for purpose in the classroom. Their experience, feedback and recommendations continue to be incredibly valuable to the success of the project nationwide.
An example music piece from the 2022-23 academic year. To see other submissions from this cohort, visit our 2022-23 Celebration gallery.
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Why should teachers be excited about Finish This…?
Finish This… is an inspiring, creative and unique entry-point into creative composition work that is designed to be inclusive of everybody – at it’s heart, promoting creativity, self-expression and collaboration. For non-specialist music teachers, you will be supported to feel confident in delivering whole-class music lessons, and for music specialists we offer a unique and creative musical starting point for you and your students to explore together, to help introduce musical concepts in a fun way! What’s more, the project is designed to make things as easy as possible, and all teachers can deliver the sessions in a way that works best for their class, at a time that suits them.
How would you describe Finish This… in 3 words?
Playful, Imaginative, and Fun!
Finally, how can schools get involved in Finish This… next year?
To find out more about the project, teachers can visit the main Finish This... page on our website, watch our project film, or express an interest to hear more using this form.