Sussex Young Musician of the Year looks to the future with confidence

As she says, she was born and brought up in Sussex and has lived here virtually all her life. And it was great to see so many friends and family supporting her in the competition final which was organised by Coro Nuovo.

Constance performed two contrasting pieces: Farewell Ye Limpid Springs from Handel’s Jephtha and Richard Strauss’s Das Rosenband, both showcasing her expressive musicality and technical skill.

Later this year, she will begin her graduate studies at London’s Guildhall School of Music & Drama. As she says, singing is who she is.

“When I was three I watched Calamity Jane for the first time and I told my mum that I wanted to sing. She sings with opera societies and groups and my dad used to be a DJ. It's a very musical household. When I was five, I joined the church choir and that's when they realised that I could sing. When I was eight, I started private singing lessons and I've never really ever wanted to do anything else.

“I love it. It's who I am. And I think the thing about Doris Day was that she was so smiley and so positive and I loved how she made me feel. And I think I can see quite a lot of similarities in myself now. I try to be very positive and very smiley. Definitely without singing I would be a very different person. I did it all the way through school, and it's what makes me happy.

“When I'm singing, I just think I'm the character in my head. That's the thing that I've learned most. I've not just done singing. I've done a lot of acting. And I think the thing that I love most about performing is becoming someone else and telling a story and connecting with people and making people feel something and making me feel something. That buzz of being on the stage is just so lovely.”

The aim is to become an opera singer: “There will be scouts in the masterclasses and you start in the chorus. I'd love to do that. You learn from that and then you start to audition for the bigger roles.”

Part also of the road ahead is to enter professional competitions, and this was Constance's first – which makes winning even more of a thrill: “I was told that I won because of the way I moved him (the adjudicator Eamonn Dougan) and the audience. Lots of people told me that I made them cry – in a good way! I think it was the emotion I put into it and he said that there was nothing that sounded fake or like I was trying to create a character. I just became that character.

“This just feels enormous now. I have not done a competition since I was about 12 which is quite a long time. I spent this last year working as a graduate music assistant in Lancing College learning how to coach so I'm so pleased this shows that I've kept up my singing practice.

“I did cry when I found out that I had won. It meant so much to me. I was born in Sussex and I studied and lived in Sussex almost all my life. And I think this it just made me realise that I can do it. Because I did an academic degree (in music at King's College London) I have not had as much performance training as if I had done a performance undergraduate degree but this really has given me an understanding how important it is to move people. Winning the competition made me feel that I can do this and that people do want to hear me sing and that they wish me well.”