Marina Connelly

(1st year Music)
Melbourne, Victoria
The Kenneth Moore Music Scholarship

First-year music student Marina Connelly, 19, wanted to come into College to experience living in a community, to gain independence while making the transition from school to University, and to challenge herself by learning new skills.

Possessing a superb soprano voice, Marina was also attracted to Trinity by the opportunity to join the Choir, and auditioned successfully. Indeed, internationally renowned singer Dame Emma Kirkby has heard Marina sing and was so impressed that she has offered to teach her if ever she is in the UK. The two continue to correspond.

In addition to her obvious musical talent, outstanding Year 12 results also earned Marina a Music Faculty scholarship.

Marina, who describes her Trinity experience so far as ‘extremely positive and exceeding expectations’, has thrown herself into College life with enthusiasm. She sang at the O-Week soirée, displayed her considerable debating skills in the O-week debate, and loved dancing the night away at the O-Week ‘Prom’.

All fairly typical ‘fresher’ activities – except that Marina has been legally blind since birth. She also has the relatively rare condition of albinism, requiring her to avoid bright sunlight. But while she may not have the gift of sight, she has been blessed with an exceptional memory – so exceptional that she ‘just remembers’ the content of her lectures, as well as all the music and words of the Choir’s extensive repertoire.

She navigates independently with a stick and does use some learning aids, including a talking computer, a CCTV reading machine, and some Braille music scores. However Marina says, ‘At Trinity, I haven’t had to announce my needs as I am used to doing. Here, people just seem to help instinctively and that’s the first place this has happened.’