Minus Two?

Conagh McMahon-Hogan with Michelle Griffin

Conagh McMahon-Hogan is a talented Mitchell Conservatorium scholarship holder, who studies Voice with Marisa Mariani-Starr and Piano with David McKay. He is pictured here singing Non Siate Ristrosi, from Mozart's Cosi fan tutte.

Conagh is St Stanislaus' College's Senior Songman of the Year and also Head Boy. He has enjoyed performing in local musical productions, including taking the roles of Major-General Stanley in The Pirates of Penzance, Mr Bumble in Oliver and Leo Bloom in The Producers.

He also enjoys working with his friends Ryan Sanders and Senio Toleafoa in Minus One. Their latest recording is their version of the Mumford and Sons song White Blank Pages.

Multi-instrumentalist, Elné le Roux

Elné le Roux, Scholarship concert, 2011

On Saturday, 2nd April this year, Mitchell Conservatorium scholarship holders presented two concerts to showcase their talents. One of these performers was Elné le Roux, pictured here playing Australian composer, Andy Firth's Big Belly Blues with accompanist Michelle Griffin.

Born in South Africa, Elné began playing the euphonium when her family moved to Queensland. She later took up the flute and saxophone and enjoys playing these in a variety of ensembles in Bathurst, including the Mitchell Conservatorium Senior Flute Choir and Bathurst RSL Band.

Take Five is one of the most iconic alto saxophone solos. Here performed by Dave Brubeck's band, and featuring Paul Desmond, the composer of the piece, on alto saxophone.

We Love Jane Rutter

Happy flutists: Felicity McKellar with Jane Rutter

Mitchell Conservatorium recently hosted a visit of Australia's famous flutist, Jane Rutter to Bathurst, Lithgow and surrounding towns. Jane is a great model for students to follow. She makes her performances so enjoyable with her amazing technical ability and sensitivity and in the way she always engages with her audience.

Students loved the way she led the flute workshops and also enjoyed being acknowledged in her concerts.

An audience member at Lithgow was greatly moved and uplifted when she attended the concert in the church, which had been the venue for her sister's funeral the day before.

Awesome String Orchestra Day

And here is one of Mozart's great pieces of music for orchestra:

Free sheet music

Stephen Watson, conducting his prize-winning entry in the composition competition

Does it surprise you to learn that our most popular post so far was the one about free sheet music? In that post, we told readers about the terrific Petrucci Music Library, which now contains 94,000 scores of music for orchestra, violin, piano, chamber ensemble, guitar and almost any instrument you could imagine.

If you are interested in playing music that is over 70 years old, this is a great site for you.

We also gave a link to a site where arranger, Richard Harris, has generously hosted oodles of pages of free copies of his arrangements of film music, popular classics, Christmas music and more.

If there is so much sheet music available free of charge (not forgetting the many illegal download sites), why would anyone visit a music store, whether physical or online, and pay for the stuff?

One good reason is that music stores sell books. Remember them? One great thing about a music book is that it probably contains music you weren't looking for, but which may be a great complement to the music you wanted.

For example, if your music teacher tells you to get a copy of Scarlatti's Sonata in C Major, L 252, you could download one from here. You'd get a readable copy and you'd have it almost instantly.

But if you decided to buy this book which contains that sonata, you'd get a modern edition, with fingering, information about the meaning of the signs on the music, advice on how to play the trills and ornaments, an introduction about Scarlatti, an article on how to paly ihs style of music and 13 other sonatas to have a play through.

You can't beat the price of a free download, but a book gives you a lot extra for only a few dollars.