Arts & Entertainment
Music and Compassion Take the Stage in Mendota Heights for 'To Haiti With Love'
Soprano alumna Karrah O'Daniel returns to Convent of the Visitation School to stage a benefit recital for relief in Haiti with fiancé and pianist Jonathan Cambry.
From Puccini to Pink and from "Rockin' Robin" to hip-hop, audience members were treated to a wide variety of musical stylings at the "To Haiti With Love" benefit recital Saturday evening at DeSales Auditorium at the Convent of the Visitation School.
The benefit concert for relief in Haiti was the idea of 2006 Visitation graduate and soprano Karrah O'Daniel, who returned to Mendota Heights with fiancé and classical pianist Jonathan Cambry to lead the recital.
Cambry, a Haitian-American from Chicago, has toured extensively to raise money for Haiti.
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"This is one of the most heart-touching things that has ever happened to me," said O'Daniel. "To sing on that stage where I grew up. And to do it for such a good cause, at an older age, it really brings back a lot of memories and it just makes it so much more special."
The production also featured singing and dancing from current and former Visitation and St. Thomas Academy students.
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Crowd favorites included "Quando M'en Vo' Soletta" from "La Boheme," "Taylor the Latte Boy" and "Life As We Know It," a two-person dance choreographed by Visitation freshman Becca Nguyen.
"This was all Karrah's idea," said Wendy Short-Hayes, artistic director of VISTA Productions. "She contacted all the alumni. I basically just sat back and got out of her way."
All proceeds raised went to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, a private charity that supports the Haitians who need it most. Since the January 2010 earthquake and the cholera outbreak that followed Haiti's death toll has risen to more than 230,000.
"This was a very special event, knowing this was Karrah's alma mater," said Cambry. "And she had so many great things to say about this place and how welcoming it is, and I could feel it the moment I walked into the door."
O'Daniel, an opera singer, graduated with a degree in vocal performance from Roosevelt University and now lives in Chicago.
"I'm just trying to sing wherever I can," she said.
O'Daniel and Cambry will be married in October in Mendota Heights.
"He inspires me every day," said O'Daniel. "I couldn't be marrying a better man and I couldn't have the fortune to perform with one, either."
