Devizes judges bowled over by top pair (From This Is Wiltshire)

Devizes judges bowled over by top pair

11:53am Thursday 3rd December 2009

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The best winners’ concert ever left adjudicators at Devizes Junior Eisteddfod on Saturday night in a quandary.

Senior adjudicator Lesley Cook said she and her fellow judge, David Price, had a huge task in choosing which performances were good enough to win the overall trophies in the junior and senior sections.

Festival patron Simon May, composer of the theme tune for EastEnders, planned to leave early as he had to be at a rehearsal for his musical Smike in Guildford the following morning.

But the standard of performance was so riveting that he stayed right to the end.

Mr May said: “This has been a fantastic evening. There is no way I could leave when such great performances were taking place.”

Mayor John Leighton congratulated each performer in turn at the end of their acts as well as presenting their trophies to them.

Mr Price and Mrs Cook were torn between presenting the William Dauntesey Trophy for best junior performance to ten-year-old Ciara Parker-Northeast from Highworth and 11-year-old Kirsty Chaplin from Broad Town.

So, as both had won classes in the senior section as well, they decided to jointly award them the Dauntesey Cup as well as the Giles Chivers Cup for best senior performance.

Ciara performed seven times during the concert as winner of violin solo 17 and under, descant recorder solo 11 and under, violin solo 11 and under, treble recorder solo 11 and under, violin solo 14 and under, recorder solo 14 and under and recorder duet 14 and under with Bella Bryan.

Kirsty enchanted the full house in the Assembly Room at Devizes town hall with her wonderful harp rendition of Rossini’s Sonata for Harp.

She followed that with stunning performances on the piano of Debussy’s Gollywog’s Cakewalk and Chopin’s Nocturne in B flat minor.

The parents of both Ciara and Kirsty were delighted they shared the top prizes.

Kirsty’s mum Janet Chaplin said: “Kirsty owes a lot of her success to performing at events like the eisteddfod. Children learn a lot about preparation and performing and about winning and losing.

“Kirsty has only been playing the harp for two and a half years but she likes it because it gives her the chance to play in an orchestra. She is a member of the National Children’s Orchestra, which is quite an accolade.”

Marcia Parker-Northeast said Ciara had won the Michael Oliver Cup for best solo string performance for the fifth year.

She said: “Ciara started playing the violin when she was four. She works hard and is determined. Although she is only ten she is thinking of music as a career.”

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