When High School South orchestras present the 14th annual Children’s Concert on Sunday, December 6, in the school’s new theater, the area will be transformed into a rodeo for the day. Along with the music, there will be a campfire sing-a-long, stick horse-riding, face painting, a surprise guest conductor, coloring books, and themed snacks, and photo opportunities with Wyatt Earp, Annie Oakley, Big Bad Bart, and Zorro. Costumes are invited to the performance. Dress up as a cowgirl, cowboy, Indian or Comanchero to receive a prize at the door. The narrators for the concert are Erica Simi and Raza Zia.
This year’s theme, “How the West Was Won,” will be followed by three orchestras — the String Ensemble, an award winning ninth grade group; the Camerata Orchestra, also an award winning group composed of 10th through 12th graders; and the Philharmonia Symphony Orchestra, an audition only group of 10th through 12th graders who have toured within the U.S. and internationally. Featured repertoire includes “The Mexican Hat Dance;” Leroy Anderson’s “Horse and Buggy;” Copland’s “Hoedown;” and music from the movies “The Mask of Zorro,” “Oklahoma,” “The Cowboys,” “The Magnificent Seven,” and “How the West Was Won.” The orchestras are under the direction of Jean Mauro, in her 32nd year of directing.
“This is the concert where the students get to let their hair down and present less formal music,” says Mauro. “We always have a lot of fun at this show.” The aim of the concert is to excite children of all ages — including the grown-up ones — about classical music while presenting it in a manner that is appealing to people with all levels of classical music appreciation. CDs of the concert will be available for purchase.
The Children’s Concert is the first concert of the year for the orchestras. Future events include the Winter Concert on Friday, December 18, featuring student senior cello soloist Rohan Rath; the South Side Orchestra Strings Festival on Friday, February 5, with Grover Middle School’s eighth grade orchestra; and the Spring Gala Concert at Ocean Grove’s Great Auditorium on Saturday, May 22, featuring a guest conductor and Carl Orff’s full work of Carmina Burana.
The musicians include:
Violin I: Grace Ro, Harrison Liew, Jun Sung Ahn, Harington Lee, Anushka Sindkar, Michael Wu, Dahlia Amande, Yeon Joo Park, Katherine Liu, Kathleen Voightsberger, Sri Harathi, Mahvish Hashmi, Sari Frankel, Rishika Ghosh, Reetika Mohanty, Raza Zia, and Gareth Dicker.
Violin II: Cheryl Peng, Sarah Yu, Veena Kumar, Nikila Venkat, Daniel Ng, Dana Lee, Jennifer Yoon, Mallory Wang, Sue Kim, Aditya Girish, Nikita Gupta, Jordan Hu, Kseniya Nadtochiy, Jennifer Sharma, Selena Seto, Sofia Alvarez, and Ying Ying Yu.
Viola: Matthew Hsu, Victoria Wang, Rebecca Shi, Tanika Raychaudhuri, Stacey Jou, Johnathan Kuan, May Chang, Jeremy Tsu, Ashleigh DeLemos, Erica Simi, Jennifer Catalano, Ashima Oza, Lawrence Goun, David Suh, Sonal Patel, Jared Meltzer, and Eric Hoff.
Cello: Doug Wallack, Rohan Rath, Catharine Wong, Roger Lin, Jonathan Ting, Rachel Carandang, Lindsey Joseph, Samantha Lee, Alexandra Werth, Paul von Autenried, Kanu Bhargava, Steven Senko, Gina Rodriguez, Matthew Meers, Daniel Messina, and Greg Snyder.
Bass: Sam Boyles, Lekha Kanchinadam, Benjamin Hong, Simon Hwang, Kirill Ravikovitch, Sahil Kulgod, Liam Kiernan, Andrew Pinelli, and Linda Wang.
Flute: Christina Chen, Alice Bae, Stephanie Ku, and Cher Lu.
Oboe: Tatyana Kozina, Ariel Wu, and John Park.
Clarinet: Minjeh Lee, Lesley Norris, June Park, and Jen Cardinale.
Bassoon: Ariel Eland and Marni Zahorsky.
French Horn: Erik Dixon-Anderson, Lisa Sher, Chris So, and Katie Bromberg.
Trumpet: Will Goldin, Tracy Mischell, Vrushabh Shah, and David Meni.
Trombone: Steven Yang and Varun Hegde.
Bass Trombone: Ethan Julius
Tuba: Chris Bromberg
Timpani: Jake Hoyne
Percussion: Mihir Odak, Mike Mortel, Dan Schloss, and Franklin Li.
Orchestra Children’s Concert, High School South, 346 Clarksville Road, West Windsor. Sunday, December 6, 1:30 and 3:30 p.m. $7. 609-936-1636. www.ww-p.org.
— Lynn Miller
