What does your new role encompass?
It’s a fantastic role, managing the music department but also looking after the many productions throughout the schools as well as supporting the enormous extra-curricular programme.
What is your vision for the School’s Music and Performing Arts department?
The performing arts give us the skills to express ourselves as a community and as individuals to the wider world. I want all children and young people at ESM to develop those skills, to communicate with confidence and imagination whether through song, dance, drama or music. The performing arts have a vital role in shaping identity and community especially now in ESM’s latest incarnation, and I look forward to hearing ideas from everyone about how we do that.
What made you decide to come back to ESM as a teacher?
It is an extraordinary community of highly dedicated people. I met so many former students throughout my time away who all remember it with such fondness, and I missed it. This is a particularly exciting time to rejoin and help contribute to its success.
What are you most looking forward to this school year?
Meeting everyone and seeing our young folk entertain and move us on the stage and the concert platform.
Are there any new performances or changes you’re hoping to implement?
I’m just enjoying things as they are at the moment, but I want to get everyone singing.
What do you think sets ESM’s Music programme apart?
We nurture our young people’s musical development from age 3 to age 18, and we have the capacity to help develop individual talents in whatever direction they grow, but also do things on a grand scale, which is huge fun.
What do you think sets ESM’s Performing Arts programme apart?
The wide range of performing opportunities that are available to every child, the emphasis on inclusion as well as excellence, and the support given by our amazing technical team, dance experts and our visiting instrumental teachers.
What’s your favourite instrument and why?
The human voice. Everyone has one; it has huge expressive potential, and it is the instrument that other instruments strive to emulate.
When you’re not immersed in teaching, what other hobbies or interests do you enjoy?
Hillwalking and exploring the wilds of  Scotland with my partner Matt and our dog River. I’m out in the countryside whenever I can be, and there are still so many new places to explore. Canoeing the Spey and camping on Harris were highlights this summer.
