Jessica Clarke Feature

Jessica Clarke is a student at Beau Soleil Music School where she has studied flute with Derek Fennell since 2018. She picked up the flute for the first time at age 13, in 2015, and thereafter completed several Trinity and ABRSM graded flute exams with distinction. At Beau Soleil she was placed as first flute for the Senior Band and has participated in many ensemble concerts and chamber music concerts. In 2018 she received the Beau Soleil progress prize for senior woodwinds. In 2019 she attended the Franschhoek Chamber Music Festival and the Stellenbosch International Chamber Music Festival, where she participated in an informal masterclass with Demarre McGill. She joined the Cape Philharmonic Youth Wind Ensemble in 2019 and was made first flute in 2020. During the pandemic she participated in an online flute forum where she challenged herself to make weekly videos of her flute playing while she could not reach live audiences.

Jessica grew up in a musical home, showing love for the arts as a child. In her teenage years, she began to take special interest in music, discovering her passion for flute. Jessica is grateful for the comfort and support that listening to music has provided for her throughout the years. She hopes to comfort others with her playing. She believes that music has ability to connect and inspire audiences and she hopes that music will always be a part of her life. Her dreams include finding her niche in the artistic world, travelling to different countries, and becoming fluent in a foreign language. She hopes to study music further.

Please click on the titles below which will take you two solo performances by Jessica.

JS Bach Sonata no. 6 in E major, BWV1035 1^st movt: Adagio ma non tanto

Edwin York Bowen Flute Sonata Op.120, 3^rd movt: Allegro con fuoco

International Double Reed Society

John Rojas recently returned from giving concerts in Granada, Spain at the invitation of the International Double Reed Society representing South Africa at this year’s conference. The program consisted of works by South African composers as well as arrangements of Afrikaans and African folk songs. Pictured with Mr Rojas is his pianist-wife Maria Elizabeth Bezuidenhout.