Five NHS Students Perform in Regional Music Festival

WOODBURY, CT - Seniors Amber Cardinal and Michael Vollmer, juniors Adella Carlson and Kaitlyn Hirschfeld, and freshman Laura Contento were chosen to participate in the Connecticut Music Educators Association’s North Region music festival Jan. 17 at New Britain High School.

Carlson, a clarinetist who performed with the all-honors wind ensemble of the National Association of Music Educators last October in Nashville, earned first chair in the festival concert band, conducted by William Drury, associate conductor of Wind Ensembles and director of the Symphonic Winds at the New England Conservatory in Boston, Mass. The band performed Overture in B Flat (Caesar Giovannini), Variations on a Mediaeval Tune (Norman Dello Joio), and American We (Henry Filmore).

Hirschfeld and Contento joined Vollmer and Hirschfeld, repeat honorees, in the all-region chorus under the direction of Jamie Spillane, associate director of music and director of Choral Studies at the University of Connecticut. The chorus performed MLK (arr. Bob Chilcott), The Heavens are Telling from “The Creation” (Joseph Haydn), Wanting Memories (Ysaye Barnwell), Sure on the Shining Night (Morten Lauridsen), and Shout Glory (Byron Smith).

Each of the students earning regional recognition based on their audition scores have also earned the right to audition for the All-State Music Festival, which will take place at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford May 2. All-state qualifiers earn the right to audition for the all-national honor ensembles.

Walter Culup, director of Music at Nonnewaug, was the chair of the North Region Festival, which draws musicians from 51 communities--Salisbury to Suffield, south to Berlin, and west to Sherman.

In Photo: Mike Vollmer, left, Laura Contento, Amber Cardinal, Kaitlyn Hirschfeld, and Adella Carlson.