Young Musician

2019 2018

The Rotary Club of Oban's Young Musician of the year was Anna Tait-Westwell. Anna is a very accomplished young musician, especially for a person of such a young age and will no doubt go on to be a hugely successful musician. The Rotary Club of Oban are delighted to support Ann and have her as our Young Musician for this Year.

Anna already has an impressive CV and is clearly a truly gifted talent.

Anna has won the Clarsach recital 3 times at the Royal National Mod
She has won the harp medal at the Edinburgh Competition Festival
She performs every year at the Highlands & Islands Music Festival – she has won Clarsach Recital, Piano Grade 4& 5 as well as Singing.
Anna has performed at the Edinburgh International Harp Festival in the 100^th Anniversary Concert for the Clarsach Society.
Anna had a composition published in the Wild Strings Jazz harp collection after winning a composition competition.
Anna started playing the fiddle aged 4 and the Clarsach aged 7.
She has a growing interest in the Paraguayan Harp – which she is learning to master.

We all wish Anna a fun year ahead as our Young Musician of the Year.

Our picture shows Anna with President Douglas Small and Rotarian Dave Waltho (Youth Convenor).

Oban Rotary's "Young Musician of the Year" for 2018 was Neil McCracken, a 15 year old student at Oban High School who specialises on the piano but is also a gifted saxophone player.

Young Neil entertained members and quests with his piano renditions to much applause at Oban Rotary's recent annual Charter Dinner, which event also raises funds for local charities. Neil has gone on from these events to be chosen as pianist for the National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland for their 2019 Summer Tour. This involves a week's preparation at Sabhal Mor Ostaig in Skye and thereafter playing in Glasgow and Belfast plus other venues.

Although the bulk of Neil's costs are covered by the NYJOS Oban Rotary provided £250 towards the amount he has to raise and President Iain Mac Intyre is seenhere presenting a cheque for this amount to Neil in which Iain also expressed good wishes from all concerned in Oban for Neil's future. Also in the picture are Rotarians L-R Roger Parry, Kees Van Rein and Douglas Small.