Schoolchildren 'must learn the meaning behind the poppy'

On 11/11/11 pupils from my school will be engaging for themselves with the moral dilemma posed by Remembrance.

Portsmouth Grammar School has a strong emotional sense of the sacrifice of war.

The War Office gave a Field Gun to the school in recognition that a higher percentage of our former pupils bore arms in the First World War than apparently any other school.

Located on the site of Richard the Lionheart’s crusading palace, we are housed in nineteenth century army barracks in a High Street which survived the Blitz.

Many of our pupils have parents and siblings currently serving in the armed forces.

A recent inscription on the school gate records that once soldiers left through this archway and that now girls and boys enter through it to learn and play.

Rather than retreat into silence, valuable though such contemplation is, I believe that young people should have the opportunity to express creatively their feelings about war.

In this way they can more meaningfully honour the dead.

Since 2001 we have commissioned each year a leading composer to work with pupils in creating a new work for Remembrance.

To mark a decade in this unique programme of commissions, pupils will be performing two of the most significant works created as part of this collaboration in St John’s, Smith Square with our orchestral partners, the London Mozart Players, on the evening of 11/11/11.

Stephen Montague’s The Last Trumpet is a mind-blowing Requiem which weaves together Portsmouth fog horns, American folk tunes and, importantly, twenty first century pupils’ poems in an unforgettable tribute to those who took part in the D-Day Landings in 1944.

Its companion piece will be the work which caused the Master of the Queen’s Music to reflect on his wearing of the poppy last year. Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ tribute to Harry Patch is a setting of Sir Andrew Motion’s poem about the life of Britain’s last great Tommy.

It is a challenging work for its young singers and has proved particularly thought-provoking for its composer.

As Sir Peter said in rehearsals, the subject matter is not easy and nor should the music be either.

My pupils will be wearing poppies for Remembrance this year and they will be raising funds for both the Royal British Legion and Help for Heroes.

But rather than marking the occasion with a two minute silence, they will be helping to create over sixty minutes’ worth of new music and in the process finding their own voice in singing for our unsung heroes.

‧ James Priory is the Headmaster of Portsmouth Grammar School.