By: Olivia Dundon-Duvall, Concert Choir
Olivia has been in BCC for 2 years. She is 12 years old.
Last Thursday, Concert Choir’s Red Choir had the wonderful opportunity to perform at the UNICEF Children’s Champion Award Dinner. Before attending this event, I was thinking along the lines of: Another concert, more music, more work! But when I got there, this place struck me as different. The guests of honor were Sting and his wife Trudie Styler. One of my fellow choir members made sure that they got a BCC CD! After and hour or so of practice downstairs, we finally got to go perform! The rooms where the dinner was being held were enormous, and I so was excited just to be there. When we got onto the stage, I couldn’t help but notice the huge jumbo-tron behind us. It was catching our every move, which was both awesome and scary at the same time. It made us sure to be professional and engaged all the time, and I think it might have even improved our performance!
Our first piece was “Climbin’ Up the Mountain, Children!”, which is a traditional African-American spiritual arranged by Rollo Dilworth. To me, this song is about climbing the “mountain” to heaven and moving forward in life. It’s an upbeat piece, and it was very fun to perform. The audience seemed engaged, too. Our second and final piece was entitled “Stand Together” and was written by (the one and only) Jim Papoulis. Some lyrics of “Stand Together” are:
“Stand alone, see the rain that’s falling down below where I’m reaching
Joining hands slowly takes us to a place we all can believe in
Side by side we could be growing hopes and dreams
If we stand together, we will sing forever of the dreams growing in our hearts
If we stand together, we will see forever, side by side, hope will find a way to our hearts”
These lyrics really outline an idealistic world. Before we performed it, this song didn’t really mean... well... anything to me. But these powerful words took on a whole new meaning when I saw the audience’s reaction. It brought me to tears to see these wonderful people genuinely touched by our voices. I hope every concert that we perform touches the audience as well as us like this one did.
Olivia has been in BCC for 2 years. She is 12 years old.
Last Thursday, Concert Choir’s Red Choir had the wonderful opportunity to perform at the UNICEF Children’s Champion Award Dinner. Before attending this event, I was thinking along the lines of: Another concert, more music, more work! But when I got there, this place struck me as different. The guests of honor were Sting and his wife Trudie Styler. One of my fellow choir members made sure that they got a BCC CD! After and hour or so of practice downstairs, we finally got to go perform! The rooms where the dinner was being held were enormous, and I so was excited just to be there. When we got onto the stage, I couldn’t help but notice the huge jumbo-tron behind us. It was catching our every move, which was both awesome and scary at the same time. It made us sure to be professional and engaged all the time, and I think it might have even improved our performance!
Our first piece was “Climbin’ Up the Mountain, Children!”, which is a traditional African-American spiritual arranged by Rollo Dilworth. To me, this song is about climbing the “mountain” to heaven and moving forward in life. It’s an upbeat piece, and it was very fun to perform. The audience seemed engaged, too. Our second and final piece was entitled “Stand Together” and was written by (the one and only) Jim Papoulis. Some lyrics of “Stand Together” are:
“Stand alone, see the rain that’s falling down below where I’m reaching
Joining hands slowly takes us to a place we all can believe in
Side by side we could be growing hopes and dreams
If we stand together, we will sing forever of the dreams growing in our hearts
If we stand together, we will see forever, side by side, hope will find a way to our hearts”
These lyrics really outline an idealistic world. Before we performed it, this song didn’t really mean... well... anything to me. But these powerful words took on a whole new meaning when I saw the audience’s reaction. It brought me to tears to see these wonderful people genuinely touched by our voices. I hope every concert that we perform touches the audience as well as us like this one did.
