The Highland Elementary School is returning with its annual interactive March Musical Madness concert tomorrow in the School Cafeteria at 6:00 p.m. The concert will be performed by the 5th and 6th-grade Orchestra Students and the Pop String Ensemble led by High School Orchestra teacher Haley Ellis. Admission is free and open to the public, especially to parents and families with young children.
The concert is sponsored by Head Start and the Crookston Early Childhood Family Education (ECFE) program. It will contain interactive songs and activities for children and students ranging from Pre-K to kindergarten. Orchestra Director Haley Ellis has worked with ECFE Coordinator Gina Gunderson and her students to come up with a plethora of activities for the children to participate in throughout the concert. “We play some songs that some of them may know, some may not. Songs like “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, “The ABCs” and other songs and they’ll get to do some fun movement activities along with them, and it’s a really fun event,” Ellis explained, “There will be some maracas that will be handed out that they can take home, as well as a read-aloud storytime with Mrs. Gunderson, who runs ECFE. We’ll break out some dancing scarfs for the kids, so they move around while we’re playing and lots of sing-a-longs. And for the song “Old McDonald Had a Farm,” we bring stuffed animals, and the little kids get to stand up and enact their animal and have their moment to shine.” Ellis will also teach the children about certain music terms and musical instruments, such as high and low pitches and sounds, and what instruments make them. She also believes that the concert will be a great way to introduce these young children to music that may stick with them for years to come. “It’s a fun concert for us, but it’s also a great recruitment opportunity. For some of these kids, this is the first time they’re ever going to hear an orchestra, and Crookston is very fortunate to have an orchestra program. We go over the basics of all the instruments they will be seeing and talking about high versus low sounds, which I know they do if they’re in preschool with their music teacher at Washington School if they’re in preschool and kindergarten, and different tempos,” Ellis explained, “So we’ll be playing songs at a fast tempo, where they’ll shaking their scarfs very quickly, and when we switch to a slower tempo, they’ll have to change their movements, so it matches. It’s a great learning opportunity for the kids as well as a fun time for them.”
The 5th and 6th-grade Orchestra will also be joined by the High School and Junior High Pop Strings Ensemble, who perform pop songs and movie soundtrack pieces with stringed instruments. Such as “Seven Nation Army” and “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” from Disney’s Encanto. The performing students are also very excited to perform the concert, including 6th-grade Violist Maddie Hanson, who explained that the performers wouldn’t just be limited to the stage and will get to interact with the kids with their songs. She is excited to see the kids dance and sing at the different tempos and songs they’ll perform and the interactions with the children.
The Highland school Orchestra has one more main concert for the school year happening on Thursday, May 12th, which is their Spring concert, which will feature the 5th and 6th-grade orchestra once again. “We’ve got a Spring Concert at Highland that’ll feature the 5th and 6th-grade orchestra again, though they will play separately. And it will feature the Band, Choir and Orchestra,” Ellis explained, “So I will probably pull out some new music after this and start preparing the groups for May 12th. There will be two performances of it, an afternoon performance during the school day and an evening one as well,”
The March Musical Madness concert will take place tomorrow, March 21st, at the Highland Elementary School Cafeteria from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. Admission is free to the public, and ECFE families can call to register their tickets by calling ECFE Coordinator Gina Gunderson at 218-281-5078.
