Mineola Schools Come Together for Music Nights

Over the past two weeks the Mineola School District has celebrated the musical talents of their students with their annual District Choral Night and Jazz Night.

By combining their performing arts nights among their schools, the Mineola School District encourages a sense of community. Students from the , , middle and high schools joined together last Tuesday as each group was able to showcase the work they’ve done throughout the year.

Mineola’s District Choral Night kicked off the musical festivities April 5 with their performance on the auditorium stage.

“This is its third year in a row,” Mineola High School Choral Director Meg Messina said. “It used to be on many years ago and they stopped doing it. Three years ago I tried to get the ball rolling and now we’re back on as an annual event.”

The show opened with the Meadow Drive/Cross Street Honors Chorus, followed by two choruses, the seventh grade chorus and the jazz chorus. The four high school choruses, The Dynamics, Treble Chorus, the A Cappella Singers and the Concert Singers were next to take the stage. The night finished with a grand finale as all the chorus groups performed “Give Us Hope” by Jim Papoulis from Sounds of a Better World.

“We held exactly one rehearsal,” Messina said. “It was for 40 minutes at 5:45. We’ve got really great kids so they make it easy and the teachers prepare them really well.”

During the finale, all of the singers filled the isles and bleachers to serenade the audience from all sides.

“The idea was that we have one event for vocalists where the youngest kids could see the development of the program,” Messina said. “It’s kind of the idea that we want them to see it as a district wide progressive art where they could stay in and do great things when they get older.”

One week later the middle school and the high school joined forces again for the annual District Jazz Night on the high school stage.

Because of the specific focus of music, there were only three groups performing. The performance started with the Middle School PM Jazz Band, followed by the AM Jazz Band and ended with the High School Jazz Band.

Each band performed three pieces before concluding with a grand finale as all three groups took the stage to perform one last song. The finale was the first time all three of the bands were able to play the piece together as a group.

“They don’t always get to hear what the goal is,” AM Jazz Band Director Don Carreras said. “We work on concepts to get a good sound out of them.”

The fine and performing arts department recognizes the benefits of combining the schools to create a community atmosphere. The performances also give the younger students something to look forward to as the move through their school careers.

Every few years Carreras will try to bring in a professional to help the kids work on their skills. The exposure is important so the middle school kids have something to look up to he explains. Although the students are not able to work with professionals frequently, they always celebrate their Jazz Night with the high school.

“They don’t hear professionals that much but hearing the high school kids is one step closer, they see where they can be,” Carreras said. “So it’s good for them to get the exposure.”