East Holds Orchestra Collage Concert

Photo by Elizabeth Anderson

Highlighting different pieces of music from around the world, the first ever themed orchestra Collage Concert will be at 7 p.m. on Tuesday Feb. 28. The tickets are $8 for adults, $5 for students or free with a student ID.

The orchestra does some sort of fundraiser almost every month, such as their annual car wash and clothing drives. Despite this, the Collage Concert is the Orchestra’s primary way of raising money for the entire year.

“When the boosters pay for general things throughout the year – like when they buy food for the group – most of the money from this concert,” orchestra teacher Adam Keda said. “It’s a big fundraiser for boosters.”

This is Keda’s first year at East and his first year organizing the Collage Concert. He chose world music as a specific theme for the event, something that hadn’t been done before.

“For me, to give this concert some kind of structure, I had to start with some kind of theme,” Keda said. “That’s where I came up with world music.”

This year’s Collage Concert will feature songs like “Miraj” from India, “Bylina” from Russia and “Hatikvah”, Israel’s national anthem.

This orchestra event is also unique in that it features groups other than the orchestra itself.

The Bollywood Dance Club, the Ukulele Club and an Irish trio called the Hartland Rovers will tie into the world music theme, and the Jazz Band and the Percussion Ensemble will also perform.

Many of the students in Orchestra are already members of these clubs, so coordinating their participation in the Collage Concert was easier for Keda.

“They’re all music kids, and now we’re able to highlight them in their other musical hobbies,” Keda said.

While making sure that they incorporated the world music theme, and with some guidance from Keda, the Ukulele club selected their music. They will be playing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “Sakura,” a Japanese folk song.

“We had to make sure that each of [our songs] are from different parts of the world,” sophomore and member of the Ukulele Club Lily Murray said. “One of them is, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” which is from Hawaii, so it has kind of a tropical feel.”

All of the separate clubs performing are responsible for rehearsing their individual parts in the concert.

“To prepare we’ve been doubling up practices and making sure everyone is ready for the dance,” sophomore Anika Radadiya, founder of the Bollywood Dance Club, said. “We’ve also gotten costumes ready for our dancers to wear.”

With the concert lasting about 90 minutes, Keda is sure that it will be full of Shawnee Mission East talent.

“I mean, music is like a world language,” Keda said. “If you look at some of the different groups we have playing, those groups lend themselves to really contributing in a very unique way, while still keeping it under the idea of world music.”