The Durango High School choir has earned a chance to perform at Carnegie Hall, but one factor separates the students from their dream performance: money.
Last May, the choir auditioned to perform with the National Youth Choir during the Festival at Carnegie Hall. They succeeded, but the cost for each student is $2,400 – a steep price for some families. The choir turned to its community for support but still hasn’t reached its goal.
“I’m thrilled,” said Petra Lyon, DHS choir director. “For this to happen for my high school kids ... that’s pretty phenomenal.”
Each year, choirs from around the country travel to New York City to sing at the annual Festival at Carnegie Hall hosted by WorldStrides, an educational travel organization. This year’s event is planned for March.
For the first time, 20 DHS students will spend three days rehearsing with some of the best conductors and choirs in the country.
Performing at Carnegie Hall is a dream come true for any artist. The hall is a national historic landmark and vibrant cultural center. DHS students would perform on the same stages as some of the world’s most accomplished artists, from Pyotr Tchaikovsky to Billie Holiday and The Beatles.
“It’s just this overwhelming feeling when you walk in the place,” Lyon said. “Not just the beauty ... this feeling that if these walls could talk, what would they say?”
While in New York City, the group will also see a Broadway show, Times Square, the Empire State building, the 9/11 Museum and Memorial, and the Statue of Liberty.
Lyon said the six-day trip would cost $50,000. Since fundraising began in October, the choir has raised an estimated $4,000 from community donors, and Lyon hopes to gather $10,000 total from the community. She also expects to hear back about a $5,500 grant soon.
Still, a few families are struggling to gather the $2,400, and Lyon is trying to decrease the total expense for all students. She said that donors can choose to sponsor a specific student or donate to the overall cost of the trip. Interested community members can email her at plyon@durangoschools.org.
Lyon has taken students on this and other trips before. No matter what the funding challenge is, she said she’s never had to leave a student behind.
“The outcome would never be that these 20 kids, who said they’re going, would not go,” she said. “I don’t give up and I don’t stop till I’ve got it done.”
Lyon pursued the opportunity, in part, because the students will be conducted by André Thomas, an award-winning, internationally recognized composer, conductor and author.
Thomas has earned lifetime achievement and distinguished service awards, including the American Choral Directors Association’s highest honor, the Robert Shaw Award, and the African Diaspora Sacred Music Living Legend title, according to his website.
Lyon has seen first-hand the connection that Thomas builds with students over three short days.
“He’s pretty phenomenal,” she said. “It would be like having a master class with someone like Meryl Streep or Robert DeNiro.”
In the past, the trip – seeing Broadway, Carnegie Hall and one of the world’s epicenters of art – has connected students to their dreams of singing professionally.
“They just woke up there,” Lyon said. “Suddenly, everything that we had been doing locally became so much more relevant.”
smullane@durangoherald.com
