ESTEVAN — The Estevan and District Music Festival wrapped up its 59th edition with two awards and highlights concerts at Trinity Lutheran Church on Sunday.
The 2 p.m. session celebrated the achievements of young talents in vocal, spoken word and band disciplines, while the evening concert was dedicated to piano performers.
Alisha Mann, the Estevan and District Music Festival president, said the festival and concerts went really smoothly this year, and they had a good turnout of participants and families to watch.
The talent this year was strong as well, but they could notice some pandemic aftereffects.
"It's great. It was great to have the live music back and all the kids back at their studies. We're lacking senior students, we don't have as many as usual. I think that's a combination of a lot of things,” Mann said.
“COVID slowed down studies for a few years for those kids so that higher age [students] are not there anymore, they've moved on. And the younger ones coming up have been delayed in their progress a little bit, but hopefully, they're getting back on the right track. And it's just encouraging to have participants' numbers back up.”
The piano always has a lot of entries, but this year the strings discipline also saw high participation, in part due to a new teacher's arrival, Mann noted. She said they hope to see further progress in that class for the festivals to come.
"It was really nice to have that different discipline represented. We're hoping to work with [the strings teacher] a little bit, and see if we can get a more specialized adjudicator in to help those students out in the future," Mann said.
With the support from local sponsors and donors, the Estevan and District Music Festival was able to provide almost $11,000 in awards and bursaries, benefitting about 130 participants.
This year, Jesse Gibson was recognized with the Murray GM Outstanding Performance in Multiple Disciplines Award and received a $500 prize. He entered six solo classes in piano and percussion.
"He has had an incredible passion for music and intends to continue with music management in the future," Mann said during the concert.
She also reminded the audience that the award was designed many years ago for students 15-18 years of age that excel in multiple disciplines. A competitor has to enter a minimum of two disciplines, perform a minimum of five solos and has to place first or second in at least four out of five classes.
This year, for the first time, there were two runner-up awards for outstanding performance in multiple disciplines, as two festival participants came tied for second. Each runner-up award comes with a $300 prize. Sarah Morris (five solos in piano and woodwind) received a Dwight Thompson Memorial Award sponsored by Hall Funeral Services Inc., and Jacob Pyra (six solos in vocals, strings and brass) was presented with the other runner-up award, sponsored by Scotsburn Dental.
Mann said they were grateful to everyone participating and involved with the festival.
"Thank you to everybody who participated, the teachers for taking the time to enroll their students, and all of our volunteers who help run our festival. It's completely volunteer-run. So, unless we have those people, we can't do it," Mann said.
Sandra Bazin was recognized as the 2022 Volunteer Award recipient.
