Judith Clingan’s Golden Jubilee celebrated in three day festival at Canberra’s Albert Hall

When I was 7 years old, a lady called Judith Clingan visited my school and offered music lessons. At that time, I certainly did not know the impact she would have on my life.

In retrospect, I don’t know if it was advertised as recorder lessons, or theory, singing or solfège, but it was a well-structured and engaging mixture of all of these things. She always used very sophisticated music – Josquin, Britten, Dowland and Rachmaninov were names we were familiar with – but all I remember from that time was that it was great fun. Her approach was very wholesome, from her musical choices down to the hand-stitched felt musical staves parents had to sew for us.

I attended her ‘Young Music Society Summer Schools’, where an instrument could be ‘tried-out’ for a fortnight and a complete musical was performed with participants making the costumes and sets. Later, I sang in Gaudeamus, an a cappella vocal ensemble that had an early music focus but also performed ambitious contemporary works such as David Fanshawe’s African Sanctus. Fearlessly, Judy led us through that project with the composer present.

Her individual contribution to...