The Leighton Park Music Department was celebrating on 24th June at the news that three students had distinguished themselves at the Independent Schools Association (ISA) national Composing Competition. The ISA is the largest professional body of independent schools in the UK, representing over 650 schools.
Eliza (U6) won 1st place in the senior category for her piece Break in the Loop, while Alana (Y11) won 2nd place in the junior category for her piece Jinx’s Lament and Micah (U6) was runner up in the instrumental group for his piece An Adventure Unfolds.
Eliza has won her age group for the last five years running, which is a stunning achievement, and may partly explain why she has been offered a full academic scholarship to study music at the prestigious Berklee College of Music (Boston) next year. Micah, meanwhile has offers to study Music at Leeds Conservatoire, Durham and King’s College London. This year ten of our students are going on to study Music at Conservatoires and leading universities.
Eliza commented: “I am so happy to have won and it is such a pleasant surprise. I am so glad that I got recognition for what I love to do. As I continue through higher education at Berklee, I plan to continue writing songs to continuously develop my skills so I can hopefully form a career out of my love for songwriting and performing.”
Alana in Year 11 added: “I am really pleased to hear that the ISA judges liked my composition “Jinx’s Lament”. As I composed this piece I was able to develop both my skills with writing more complex harmonic accompaniments as well as my ability to use the recording software which will be useful for future projects. I am really looking forward to consolidating my songwriting skills over the next two years when I am hoping to go on to study Music and Music Tech at A Level in the Sixth Form at LP. I am also hoping to continue studying songwriting at university after I leave school. Congratulations to all the other entrants – I have enjoyed listening to your compositions!”
Our students’ success in this song-writing competition follows on from Leighton Park students also winning 1st and 2nd place in the national ISA Young Musician Competition, and the Music Department being recognised as one of the top departments in the country as a Finalist for the Outstanding School Music Department Award in the prestigious Music and Drama Education Awards 2025.
Commenting on the success in the Composing Competition Rosemary Scales, Director of Music and Media, enthused: “I am so thrilled that the composition skills of 3 of our students have been recognised on a national stage in the ISA Composing competition. Each of them showed real originality, creativity and flair in their work. Eliza’s fifth consecutive win as she has worked up through the age groups is an incredible achievement – a real testament to her dedication and musical imagination. It’s so rewarding to see our composers sharing their creativity and being celebrated for it. We are very proud of them all.”
The Music Department at Leighton Park support a huge variety of musical opportunities, from absolute beginners to those with their sights set on the Conservatoires and a musical career. Over 60% of our students learn at least one instrument and our 27 peripatetic music teachers deliver a range of lessons as diverse as the euphonium, the accordion and the harp to the more traditional options of piano and violin. There are performance opportunities during lunchtimes, evenings and al fresco at our annual Music for a Summer’s Evening event as well as biannual international concert tours and musical theatre shows.
The team encourage music for all at every level and our Year 7s have instrumental lessons in strings, brass and woodwind as part of their curriculum teaching to give everyone a chance to discover whether or not they might be interested in pursuing music further. Our co-curricular programme delivers over 90 hobbies each week with around 30% of these in the performing arts, including plenty of musical options from orchestra and bassoon ensemble to Rock Band and Chamber Choir, plus many more in between! Find out more at https://www.leightonpark.com/music/
If you, or someone you know, is interested in applying for a Music Scholarship at Leighton Park the deadline for those joining the school in September 2026 is Friday 7th November for Sixth Form applicants and Friday 14th November for those in Years 7 and 9. Further details are available at https://www.leightonpark.com/scholarship/
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