Lower School Music Students Attend NJ Symphony Concert

On Friday, March 31 the Lower School Band, Orchestra, and Chorus students travelled to NJPAC (New Jersey Performing Arts Center) in Newark for a New Jersey Symphony Link Up Concert: The Orchestra Moves. 

For more than 30 years, Link Up—a program of Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute - has paired orchestras with students in grades 3–5 at schools in their local communities to explore orchestral repertoire and fundamental musical skills.

“By any definition, music moves. As organized sound, music moves through time. We can perceive music as moving through space from high to low, filling the spaces in between with harmonies, timbres, and textures. Music moves us, evoking a full range of emotional responses, and music compels us to move our bodies and create dance.”

Through the Link Up repertoire, hands-on activities, and a culminating interactive performance with a professional orchestra, students discover all the interwoven ways in which the orchestra moves. The Link Up program addresses National Core Arts Standards for Music.

Lower School Band, Orchestra, and Chorus students prepared with Mr. Propper, Dr. Sobieski, and Mrs. Geene prior to the concert singing, dancing, and exploring the musical elements of Cidade Maravilhosa by Andre Filho (Brazil samba), The Blue Danube by Johann Strauss II, Symphony No. 5 by Ludwig van Beethoven, The Marriage of Figaro Overture by W.A. Mozart, Danzon No. 2 by Arturo Marquez (Mexico), Un Dos Tres by Angelica Negron (Puerto Rico),  Toreador from Carmen by George Bizet, Barcarolle by J. Offenbach, as well as an introduction to the instrument families (String, Brass, Woodwind, Percussion).

"We really enjoyed listening, dancing, and singing along with the other students and orchestra at the performance on Friday," said Mrs. Geene.