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How did you and music come together in the first place?

Oh, the happy marriage of music and me. I came from a fairly musical family. My mother had been a pianist and an organist, and my father really enjoyed singing. It was natural that we kids would learn music when we were at school, even though it was certainly nothing like learning music at Sydney Grammar School.

I started playing the cello when I was in about Year 5 or Year 6 and went through school and the Conservatorium. Afterwards, I did some teaching and went on to study music in Salzburg. I came back to Sydney and was working professionally as a cellist, but I had to make a decision about whether I was going to pursue performing or teaching. To tell you the truth, teaching was the more certain career path, and that’s what I chose.

When you were playing cello in those earlier years, you came to Grammar, didn’t you?

When I was 14, I joined the Sydney Youth Orchestra (SYO) and we would rehearse at Grammar. I worked my way up in those groups, and even performed with Mr Peter Seymour, who was the founder of the SYO. I’d been coming to Grammar every Saturday since I was 14 years old.

There were a lot of Grammar boys in the Sydney Youth Orchestra. I knew that this school had a phenomenal music programme and the reputation of Mr Peter Seymour and Mr Tod Piekos before I came to work at Grammar.

Pictured: Ms Rita Fin conducting in 1996. Credit: Sydney Grammar School Archives

Pictured in header: Ms Rita Fin congratulates the 65-piece orchestra after an epic performance at her farewell concert

When you started down the teaching path, did you work at a few different schools?

I started teaching when I was a student at the Conservatorium, teaching as a music specialist at Crown Street Public School. Then, when I graduated, I did a year at Ascham School. Afterwards, I received a scholarship to study in Salzburg.

When I returned from Salzburg, I commenced a role at the International Grammar School teaching music and Italian. The concept of the school was bilingual education. My background is half Italian and I could speak Italian. Over time, I moved into the administration side of the school and was deputy of the high school. For my last four years I was Principal at the school, a very young principal. I was 27, which was possibly the youngest principal in New South Wales at the time.

Pictured: Ms Rita Fin accepts a round of applause after concert in Big School ca. 1992. Credit: Sydney Grammar School Archives

You came to Grammar in 1991 to focus more on music rather than school administration.

That’s the reason. It was actually one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever made in my life to leave IGS and come to Grammar, but I’d been missing making music at such a high level. The music programme at Grammar really fascinated me, and I knew so many people who had been to Grammar, and I had the connection with Mr Tod Piekos.

What did you do to increase the profile of the Music department?

I was the Director of Music for the first fourteen years. When I started at Grammar – because I had come from a K–12 school – I could really see that our programme was lacking communication with the preparatory schools that were our feeder schools. I made it my business to really connect with both preparatory schools. I think Music was the only department to do that at the time. We built a teaching programme which was sequential, and included more aural and practical elements than there had been previously.

I looked at sport and thought, well, each sport has a captain, why doesn’t music have a captain? I went to Headmaster Ralph Townsend and said that I thought we should have a captain and music committee. He agreed and Tim Hollo (OS 1993) was our very first Captain of Music in 1993. We still have the Music Committee and Captain today, who assist the Music staff and help run concerts.

I started the School Eisteddfod where I would listen to 500 boys perform over a ten-day period, write each of them a report and follow up. It was a really interesting window to see how the teaching was progressing and to touch base with the boys one on one.

Pictured: Ms Rita Fin and Marshall Kim (OS 1996). Credit: Sydney Grammar School Archives

I went to Ralph Townsend and asked why we didn’t have a School song. I thought we should have a School song as it is great for the boys to be able to sing at ceremonial occasions and Speech Day. Ralph Townsend decided that the School song should be to the tune of “Gaudeamus igitur” – which is a very famous university academic song – and Mr John Sheldon wrote the words in Latin. To this day we still sing the School song, and they “sing a little Latin”, as the boys say in their sport chants.

After this long period of music, you then became the Assistant to the Headmaster. What was it like to go back into school administration at that level?

What I enjoyed most was working with the broader range of people in the School, working with every other master and support staff. I enjoyed the aspects of making life easier for people through smooth administration. I think for two or three years, I was supervising all the support staff in the School while still teaching First Form and still conducting the School Orchestra. I have to say that was one of the most enjoyable parts of the job.

Pictured: Ms Rita Fin conducting the orchestra and choir at Town Hall in 2001. Credit: Sydney Grammar School Archives

How did you help the School navigate through the tricky COVID-19 period?

The COVID-19 days were really weird. We were lucky we all got laptops before lockdown and that teaching from home could actually happen. Having said that, the senior staff didn’t have one day working from home. We were on site every day to manage staff and work behind the scenes to ensure things ran smoothly. We had five to ten pupils on site every day, interacting with them and making sure that they were OK.

I had to have a big contingency plan for what we would do if we had a breakout during the HSC examinations and I worked out where every single boy in Sixth Form would go if we had a breakout at College Street. Some boys would’ve gone to St Ives and some others to Edgecliff. Luckily it didn’t come to that, but it took many hours of working out.

Pictured: An orchestra made up of Old Sydneians performing at her farewell concert

How different is the Grammar of 1991 to the Grammar of today?

In many ways, there’s very little difference in our approach to the classroom. It is the most important thing that we do here. I like that Grammar hasn’t gone down the technology path, where kids are on laptops and devices all the time.

In terms of music, I think the programme has developed greatly over the 34-and-a-half years – now into its 35th year – since I started. There are more boys continuing with music and more opportunities for boys who simply enjoy playing their instrument, whereas previously it had been for the best players. I think that’s fantastic.

As you leave Grammar behind and go and do other things, what’s on the to do list?

Before we get to the list, I would like to mention how grateful I am that the School, the Old Sydneians and Music staff put on a fantastic farewell concert for me last year. It was fabulous to have the Old Sydneians coming back as far as 1991 to make a full Symphony Orchestra, and afterwards to be able to share my memories with them and have a little party, that was very special and I’ll treasure it forever.

As for the future, I’m really enjoying the slow mornings and not rushing out the door at 6:30am to get to my desk, turn on the computer and respond to emails. There will be months of travel on the agenda, at least for this year.

Pictured: Ms Rita Fin at the conductor’s podium

Below is a video showing some performance highlights from Rita’s farewell concert in 2025

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