Imagine this: you join a choir as an elementary schooler and step out onto the stage for your first performance of the season - maybe it’s even your first performance ever.
It takes your eyes a few seconds to adjust to the bright stage lights as you search for your conductor. You spot her, take a breath, and get ready to sing.
This is no ordinary performance, though…because there are thousands of people in the audience, and the stage is the iconic Hollywood Bowl!
While this might sound like a dream, it was reality for over 40 of our choir students this past November when they were given the chance to sing in “Encanto at the Hollywood Bowl.” The live-to-film concert experience was filmed and is now streaming exclusively on the Disney+ platform.
With just a few weeks to prepare, our Elemental Choir and our Elemental @ Broadway Grades 3–5 Choir learned a brand new arrangement of “Dos Oruguitas” to sing in Spanish alongside Colombian musician Andrés Cepeda for two nights of performances.
Photo credit: Disney/Temma Hankin
This was an amazing experience for our choir students! Not only did these young singers create lifelong memories of performing at the world-famous Hollywood Bowl, rehearsing and singing with the amazing Andrés Cepeda, and even meeting Lin Manuel Miranda backstage, but they also got to bond across choirs.
Students spent hours together in additional rehearsals, as well as backstage on each performance day, and it was heartwarming to see the camaraderie that blossomed out of this exciting weekend of performances.
Music education can open up once-in-a-lifetime opportunities for students, and this was definitely one of them!
To hear our students “Encanto at the Hollywood Bowl” on Disney+, click here.
To make a tax-deductible donation to support our music education programs, which will serve nearly 600 students this season, please click here. Every donation helps support our young musicians!
