How Do You Get to Carnegie Hall?

Just weeks ago, four young Shorewood violin students performed in an internationally-attended special concert at Carnegie Hall.

Lake Bluff first-grader Amelia Calderon-Henes, and sisters Isabella, Lake Bluff first-grader, Annalise, Lake Bluff sixth-grader, and their older sister Emilie Lozier, Shorewood High School freshman, shared the stage with a group of 750 violinists from all over the country for the 40^th Annual School for Strings Festival Graduation Concert, May 27.

"I will never forget the sound," Isabella said. "It was huge, and magical."

The experience has re-invigorated Joanne Haasler, the girls' teacher, and a 1982 graduate of the School for Strings teaching school who has taught in Shorewood for over 25 years. 

"Every five years they invite graduates to bring students to come and play there," she said. "I've never done it, but chose to this year because I have such a good group." 

She said she is proud of the girls' preparation and performance.

"It was exciting," Haasler said. "I really think the kids were inspired, too."

Isabella said the group practiced hard leading up to the performance.

"At minimum, twenty minutes a day. Maximum, I do an hour, especially getting ready for this concert, we had to learn the right music and be able to play it on stage," Isabella said.

Ninth-grade Emile said, "Since we play from memory, I feel like we really learn the song from the inside."

The concert was arranged in a "play-down" format, in which musicians perform the most difficult piece first, working their way to the simplest pieces. There is a constant rotation of players this way, who come in at their own level and play down to "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star".

Haasler has studied and employs different teaching methods, but, she says, "Suzuki is a great basis and I love the message. These kids generally start at age 3 or 4, and they develop an ear for it very quickly."

This group is no exception. Isabella started at age 3.  Amelia started at 4. Annalise and Emilie started early in first and second grade.

A Carnegie Hall performance for anyone, let alone a first-grader, is arguably a life-changing event, but this was especially sweet for the Lozier girls with family in New York. They had been given T-shirts early on by their grandmother that asked on the front, "How do you get to Carnegie Hall?" and on the back "Practice, Practice, Practice!"

Even though they have performed together as a trio, Emilie was touched by playing on stage with her sister Annalise.

"It was really special to see her in front of me, and know we'd practiced at home for this moment," Emilie said.

After the concert, the group went to Sambuca, an Italian restaurant in New York, and performed an impromptu violin serenade for their teacher in the restaurant.

Savanna Rostad, first-grader at Cumberland Middle School; Lizzy Pantoga Montoto, first-grader at Milwaukee Montessori; and Fiona Pantoga Montoto, sixth-grader at Golda Meir were also part of Haasler's group of violin students that performed at Carnegie Hall.