Students arriving for violin summer school

Talented violin students from New Zealand and overseas arrive in Queenstown today for the eighth annual Queenstown Violin Summer School (QVSS).

The students, who are aged between 8 and 25, will work with professional musicians and teachers in daily lessons, master classes, concerts and Feldenkrais Method movement awareness classes.

The programme aims to foster solo performances for career-oriented and advanced violin students.

The students are selected by audition, and almost 30 are coming.

They hail from Dunedin, Gore, Christchurch, Blenheim, Nelson, Wellington, Cambridge, Hamilton, Auckland, Whangarei, Australia, Malaysia and Brunei Darussalam.

Dunedin violinist Annabel Drummond (15) returns for her seventh year.

Violinist Laura Barton (15), of Gore, will also attend.

Violinist Kevin Lefohn, school founder and artistic administrator of the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra, leads a teaching staff of three pianists and seven top international violinists, including Professor Yair Kless, of Graz University, in Austria; winner of the 2005 Michael Hill International Violin Competition Feng Ning and New Zealand Symphony Orchestra concertmaster Vesa-Matti Leppänen.

"The students come with repertoires learned then they work with their teachers for two weeks," Mr Lefohn said.

He encouraged Wakatipu residents and visitors to come and enjoy the festival's showcases.

Performers wanted to delight, move and entertain with their efforts, he said.

In a competition in St Peter's Anglican Church, on Saturday, January 16, staff will choose a QVSS student to perform solo with the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra in its ASB Classical Sparks outdoor concert at Hagley Park in Christchurch on February 5.

The winner will be announced at the screening of the movie 4 in the Wakatipu Room of Skyline on Sunday, January 17.