A local student dedicated to her craft performed better than everyone in her province-wide category, earning a prestigious award from a well-respected and world-renowned arts institution.
Lydia Kinasewich, 14, of 108 Mile Ranch, was awarded a gold medal from The Royal Conservatory of Music recently in Vancouver for scoring the top mark in British Columbia on the Grade 8 Speech Arts and Drama examination.
Headquartered in Toronto and founded in 1886, the Royal Conservatory of Music is an organization dedicated to music education.
With attention to prose and delivery, Kinasewich performed a number of dramatic readings for a Royal Conservatory examiner in Prince George in June. Her mark of 88 per cent was the highest in the province for her category.
Kinasewich, who's now in Grade 9, has been studying speech arts since the age of five. A regular in annual Festival of the Arts competitions, she loves drama and acting, which go hand-in-hand with speech arts.
“I've made a lot of friends,” she says. “It's been a good experience.
"And I've gone down for the [Festival of the Arts] provincials, and that's really cool. There are a lot of people down there and seeing the older kids doing it is really inspiring.”
Ginny-Lou Alexander, who teaches out of her home in 100 Mile House, is Kinasewich's longtime coach.
“She works very hard,” Alexander says of her student before a lesson on Nov. 25.
“She does her due diligence, memory work and looking up what words mean. [She] really understands what she's doing.”
Perfecting the art of speaking has benefits, which transcend the world of arts, and there's no telling where its pursuit will take you, the coach explains.
“I really think it's important to be able to communicate as you're growing up. Communication is necessary. She can't always just do it this way,” Alexander adds, thumbing an imaginary cellphone.
“It's certainly the opposite of texting.”