Talk:Chetham's School of Music

Notable Alumni

Reverted to edition without Postman Pat as a notable alumnus; Im not saying he didn't study at Chets, just that it's unlikely. If user 83.99.18.184 - or anyone else for that matter - can provide evidence to the contrary, feel free to revert it back. M A Mason 23:17, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

Pronunciation

Anyone care to comment on how "Chetham's" and "Chet's" are pronounced? Flapdragon 12:23, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I've always heard "Chetham's" as "Cheat-ums", and then "Chets" as 'Ch' as in 'chair', then 'et' as in 'bet'. I don't know enough about IPA to add it though. Also, I'm sure about the grammatical rules for including the apostrophe in a Chet's/Chets contraction. Lambyuk 00:31, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's as "Cheat" "Umz" if you get that. --Alex⁹⁸⁹¹ 00:33, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Pheonix Brass Quintet and the G-Floor links

Anyone know why these two external links are in this article? Pheonix Brass Quintet states on the site that they were formed by students of Royal Northern College of Music and the G-floor appears to be some English guy's personal website. Is there something more to them than that? --Siobhan Hansa 21:02, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I think they should go, they don't really add anything to the article. --Alex (Talk) 21:12, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

That's good enough for me! I took them out. If another editor knows why they were here please let us know. Thanks --Siobhan Hansa 21:26, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

They were there because two members of the Phoenix Brass Quartet studied at chets, and the G-floor used to be chets' "underground" website (referring obviously to the palentine practice block) and had gossip, news, photos etc. but has since morphed more into a personal site. Were you guys even at chets??

I wasn't. Why would you assume editors of this article attended the school? Thanks for clearing up the mystery. The links you're describing seem a bit tenuous for an encyclopedia article. I suggest they stay off the page. -- Siobhan Hansa 04:23, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Pictures

Refs required.... any pictures. Welcome Victuallers 15:23, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Picture

I uploaded and added a free photo from Flickr. It isn't the best, but better than nothing. I'll try and get one myself. Majorly (talk) 13:35, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Alumni list

Clearly there are a lot of notable alumni, given the nature of the school. I've trimmed it down to 20 but still feel that's too many. At the moment, it's just a list but would prefer it in prose. Any thoughts? AD 01:14, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

It would be better in prose, perhaps the alumni should have a separate article/list. These sections can overwhelm an article. Just a thought.--J3Mrs (talk) 00:18, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

A separate article is a good idea. AD 00:19, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Chetham's School of Music/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Bencherlite^Talk 21:51, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

No dab links. No external link problems. On images, File:Mike Lindup 01 wikipedia.jpg doesn't have a source; the user who uploaded it, Nadworks (talk · contribs), is inactive and has various image-related warning messages on his/her talk page. I think it would be better to find another alumni image, if needed. The conducting one of Grant Llewellyn looks OK (it appears that the orchestra itself released the image).

I'm going through and making a few changes as I see minor problems, and hopefully the reason for these changes will make sense. More major problems below:

• I think the sources are fine, although it would be good to have some sources that weren't connected with the school in the "Academics and pastoral care" section apart from one BBC page about the 2006 to 2009 GSCE results. (Anything more recent? Anything about A-levels?) Any independent assessments of the school?
• One problem I see straight away, which is fixable, is the bulleted list of names under "notable alumni". Wikipedia:Manual of Style (embedded lists) (part of the GA criteria) says that such lists should be written as prose. I see that there was some discussion on the talk page about this before the GA nomination.
• Is the image of Manchester Cathedral best positioned there? It squeezes text between two images, which is undesirable.
• The "Humphrey Chetham" section is a bit short and you end up with some duplication with or misplacement in the next section ("Charity school: 1653 to 1939") - both sections talk about his executors, and the bit about his will would seem to fit better in the previous section.
• I wonder whether the number of subsections under "Academics and pastoral care" can be reduced. Some of them are quite small - perhaps an "admissions and curriculum" followed by a "school life"? Shouldn't admissions come before curriculum, logically speaking?

"When a chorister reaches Year 8, or their voice break, they can apply to join Chetham's senior school." Eh? That's the first mention I can find of there being a senior school - some explanation needed, please! Also translate "year 8" for people who don't know what it means (like me... new-fangled terminology)

More later; it's going to take some time to go through everything. It's on the right lines, though, I think. Bencherlite^Talk 22:37, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

I've removed both of the alumni images as they don't really fit. I don't see a good way to write the list of alumni as prose. I've followed your other suggestions, and I'll see if there's any third-party sources. AD 12:01, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Looking nearly there. A discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (embedded lists) seems to be suggesting that there should be more flexibility in the list/prose issue, so that's unlikely to be a deal-breaker. I'm still a bit puzzled about Chethams and the cathedral choristers - are they students at the school, or elsewhere, or both, when they are choristers? Saying "join Chetham's proper" suggests to me that they aren't at the school beforehand (and I'm not sure "join Chetham's proper" is the best phrase, but I can't think of an alternative as I'm not entirely sure what the deal is). I think it's close enough to put it "on hold" for a week or so, to see if you can come up with any third-party sources about school life, and to try to get my thick head to understand this chorister thing! Bencherlite^Talk 13:03, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

As far as I know, choristers are educated at the school, but don't have to have an audition - they enter through the church. After Year 8 (or about 13) they have to join via the audition process. TBH I don't think there will be any 3rd-party refs for school life, and the school is usually the most reliable/accurate on that. AD 22:11, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose quality:

   B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:

2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?

   A. References to sources:

   B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:

   C. No original research:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

   B. Focused:

4. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

5. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:

   B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

   A lovely article, mixing history and modern school details nicely. Suggestions for future improvement would be adding more about the history of the school and some external commentary about its education, but I'm happy it meets the criteria as it currently stands. Well done! Bencherlite^Talk 17:10, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Removal of sourced content

I understand that there may be sensitive issues, but this is an encyclopaedia and is not censored. Certainly there is room for discussion about its content and what is and is not appropriate; there are arguments which can be brought, but just repeatedly editing out of the article text of which one does not approve is never going to work out well. The material over which concern has been expressed is already in the public eye - rather thoroughly so, one might add - so it is hard to see the practical value of the exercise anyway.

The article has no obligation towards Chets or anyone else - its job is just to contain the facts. Editors working on it, in consensus, can agree what those facts are and what is appropriate. If a member of staff had stolen a packet of paperclips then you would find plenty who would agree that it didn't need to be here as it gives undue weight to something which is trivial and has nothing to do really with the article topic - but that is not what we have here. To suppress what seems to be a highly relevant fact about the institution makes it look like Wikipedia is trying to help sanitise its image ... which would be particularly odd when you look at Chets's own website at the moment - I mean, have you seen it?

Given that, how is it helping to simply remove, over and over (and in breach of 3RR, over which the editor has been warned), the same content which is so thoroughly everywhere else on the internet? Who would it help, and how would it help them, to have this article as a little secret garden which is the only place where this never happened? I am honestly and truly baffled. I invite the other editor here to discuss their concerns and perhaps try to help us understand what is going on here, because at the moment I am not getting it.

With best wishes to all DBaK (talk) 13:14, 16 February 2013 (UTC)

Separate article needed on sex abuse scandal?

I've added information from the BBC and the Independent on the latest police statements, and in view of the expanding nature and scale of the inquiries reorganised the information in the article into a separate sub-section. I also think it should be mentioned in the lead. I've also mentioned the latest school statement. Do others feel that the time is right yet to have a separate article on the Chetham's School of Music sexual abuse scandal (or Operation Kiso), or should the information be retained in this article - bearing in mind that it seems as though the inquiries may go on for some time yet, potentially unbalancing the article as a whole? For comparison, see Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal, North Wales child abuse scandal, and Elm Guest House child abuse scandal - though I recognise this one may not be as major in terms of numbers involved. Ghmyrtle (talk) 09:57, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Concerning which: Frances Andrade did not commit suicide. From http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-28489500 we read 'At the inquest, Mr Travers [the coroner] ruled out a verdict of suicide'.

Campus Buildings

Now Chetham's have built another building. The music department is no longer in the Palatine building, and the classrooms in Millgate are no longer in use.

George George8211 (talk) 10:29, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

External links

The link to Ian Herbert's essentially anecdotal piece for the Independent seems inappropriate to me.

StephenJPC (talk) 10:13, 5 October 2013 (UTC)