STUDENTS and pupils from East Cornwall and West Devon have turned in outstanding performances at the Plymouth Festival of Music, Speech and Drama, held last week.

Callington Community College Choir was this year entered into the festival for the first time — and took first prize.

The choir beat Devonport High School for Girls in its category by one mark and won the Winnicott Shield.

It also obtained the highest mark of any choir performing that day and was awarded the Travers-Stubbs Trophy.

As an ensemble, members performed two contrasting pieces: Si NjayNjayNjay, a tradition Zulu song and Soul Sister by Train, the latter of the two being the choir's own arrangement.

This went down very well with the adjudicator, who commented that the performance was among other things 'highly original'.

A spokesperson for the school said the choir was thrilled to have received these awards which was testament to the hard work put in by students.

The festival also drew a large number of Kelly College students to demonstrate their skills in dramatic arts.

They performed in each of the speech, drama and music categories and achieved several first place positions.

These included Selwin Hulme-Teague and Harry Peak both for humorous verse, but in different classes; Julia Howard in the Thomas or Scanell Poem category, Elizabeth Barnes for newsreading, Sophie Whitfield for sight reading and Will Bennett for public speaking.

Pupils also scored highly in the duo categories, in which two work together in a single performance.

Ted Jenks and Richard Bennett achieved two first place positions in the duo mime and the poetry dialogue categories.

Sophie Whitfield, Elizabeth Barnes and Selwin Hulme-Teague all performed extremely well, achieving two top three positions each.

Mount House School took part in the event, and were awarded certificates, either commended, merit or distinction categories.

Outstanding performer for Mount House was Linus Pomeroy (pictured left), who won trophies in two categories, and came second in another.

His all-round talent showed through as he won his solo verse speaking category, took the Fiona Baker cup for winning his solo acting category, and was runner-up in the prose reading competition, losing out by only a single point.

Distinctions were awarded to Ella Cunningham and Benedict Thornton-Wood in their respective solo verse speaking categories. Eight other pupils gained merits, and nine more were commended.