CHARLES KONG SOO

"Mu­sic gives a soul to the uni­verse, wings to the mind, flight to the imag­i­na­tion and life to every­thing.”—Pla­to

Sev­en­teen-year-old T&T Youth Phil­har­mon­ic (TTYP) cel­lo soloist Chelsea Fen­som has al­ways been an "A" stu­dent at St Joseph Con­vent (SJC) Port-of-Spain.

The Form Five stu­dent al­so plays five oth­er mu­si­cal in­stru­ments and is heav­i­ly in­volved in her school’s ex­tra-cur­ric­u­lar ac­tiv­i­ties in­clud­ing a mem­ber of the choir, cap­tain of the steel or­ches­tra, the SJC and CIC com­bined choir, the SJC triathlon team and the school’s UN­ESCO team to name a few.

While most chil­dren spent their East­er hol­i­days at the malls, shop­ping, watch­ing movies or at the beach, be­sides mu­sic, Fen­som had to forego these ex­tra-cur­ric­u­lar ac­tiv­i­ties as she is prepar­ing to sit the FT­CL (Fel­low­ship of Trin­i­ty Col­lege, Lon­don), Lev­el 7 Fel­low­ship Cer­tifi­cate of Diplo­ma Mu­sic "Cel­lo" and her CSEC ex­am­i­na­tions in May.

She did make the time ear­li­er this year to play with Nu­trien Sil­ver Stars Steel Or­ches­tra at the Panora­ma fi­nals on March 2, where the band placed eighth; give a cel­lo per­for­mance at SJC’s fund-rais­ing con­cert Be­lieve: The Songs of Hope, at the Church of the As­sump­tion in Mar­aval, on April 14 to raise funds for the school choir to sub­sidise trav­el and ac­com­mo­da­tion ex­pens­es to per­form abroad at Dis­ney World in Ju­ly; par­tic­i­pat­ed in TTYP’s recital See our Stars Shine on April 7 for stu­dents get­ting ready for their mu­sic ex­ams where she per­formed her FT­CL ex­am test piece Haydn's Con­cer­to No 2 in D Ma­jor for cel­lo and or­ches­tra; and per­formed 10,000 Rea­sons and Via Do­lorosa on the cel­lo at Good Fri­day mass at St Bene­dict’s Catholic Church, La Ro­maine.

Her reg­i­men dur­ing the East­er hol­i­days con­sist­ed of trav­el­ling from her home in St James for lessons at the St Au­gus­tine Com­mu­ni­ty Col­lege, two hours of study­ing af­ter lessons in the morn­ing at NALIS, Port-of-Spain, re­lax for an hour af­ter reach­ing home, then switch­ing to study­ing the cel­lo every day and un­wind play­ing games on her cell­phone.

She spent Good Fri­day home with fam­i­ly—sis­ter Ce­leste, 23, who plays the oboe with the TTYP, moth­er, Sharmin and fa­ther, Car­los—mak­ing hot cross buns.

A dancer with the No­ble Dou­glas Dance Com­pa­ny, she was ex­cit­ed about the Avengers: Endgame movie and Us in cin­e­ma hav­ing watched the Mar­vel uni­verse pre­quels at home on DVD and has nev­er watched an episode of Game of Thrones.

Fen­som said "It’s just been lessons and prac­tis­ing for CSEC ex­ams. I’m do­ing nine sub­jects, Maths, Eng­lish, Lit­er­a­ture, French, Span­ish, Bi­ol­o­gy, Physics, Chem­istry and Add Maths." Lit­er­a­ture ex­am was on May 8 and mu­sic ex­am the fol­low­ing day.

"I’ve been play­ing the cel­lo for sev­en years, vi­o­lin ten years, pan ten years, pi­ano three years, French horn for less than a year and the cu­a­tro for three years.

"I start­ed play­ing the vi­o­lin at the age of sev­en and was in­tro­duced to the cel­lo three years lat­er by Mr Ken­neth Listhrop, the founder and mu­sic di­rec­tor of the T&T Youth Phil­har­mon­ic (TTYP).

"Since then I’ve pur­sued prac­ti­cal ex­ams in both in­stru­ments to­geth­er, start­ing from grade five from the Roy­al School of Mu­sic Lon­don."

She was award­ed a Grade 8 Mer­it in vi­o­lin and a Grade 8 Dis­tinc­tion in cel­lo achiev­ing the high­est grad­ed mark in the his­to­ry of the TTYP for a Grade 8 stu­dent.

Fen­som, a mem­ber of the T&T Aquat­ics Swim­ming Club, said Listhrop saw that she was mu­si­cal­ly gift­ed and aca­d­e­m­i­cal­ly strong and he en­cour­aged her to sign up for the As­so­ciate of Trin­i­ty Col­lege, Lon­don in Cel­lo (AT­CL Cer­tifi­cate of Diplo­ma).

She re­ceived the high­est award of dis­tinc­tion in that ex­am mak­ing her the first and youngest per­son to achieve an AT­CL (Lev­el Four) Cer­tifi­cate of Diplo­ma Mu­sic "Cel­lo" in T&T and the Eng­lish speak­ing Caribbean at the age of 15 in 2017.

When Fen­som re­ceived her mu­sic diplo­ma at 15, she was con­sid­ered a pro­fes­sion­al and could not en­ter Mu­sic Fes­ti­vals.

She then signed up for the LT­CL (lev­el 6 ) Li­cen­ti­ate Cer­tifi­cate of Diplo­ma Mu­sic "Cel­lo" in 2018 in which she al­so passed.

Fen­som al­so teach­es cel­lo and vi­o­lin but has cut back be­cause of her CSEC and mu­sic ex­ams.

She said a good cel­lo costs $15,000, she has to re­place the strings on her cel­lo which cost US $200 twice a year and the bow costs be­tween US $300-$400.

Af­ter com­plet­ing Form Six, Fen­som is hop­ing to get a schol­ar­ship be­cause she wants to fur­ther her­self in mu­sic and be like British cel­list Jacque­line du Pré or Chi­nese-Amer­i­can cel­list Yo-Yo Ma.

She said she would jump at the op­por­tu­ni­ty to play with the world-renowned cel­list Ma if it pre­sent­ed it­self

and would love to per­form at the famed Carnegie Hall in New York City.

Af­ter her school and mu­sic ex­ams, Fen­som will be­gin prac­tis­ing with the TTYP’s for its up­com­ing con­certs, a Gospel con­cert We are not Ashamed, at the Cen­tral Bank Au­di­to­ri­um, on May 25 and the or­ches­tra’s af­ter mu­sic camp’s grand con­cert Ro­man­tic Over­tures—An­i­mat­ed Clas­sics at NA­PA, on Au­gust 4 as part of the or­ches­tra and the Eu­an­ge­lion Choir’s 20th-an­niver­sary cel­e­bra­tions.