4,000 Area Students Will Attend Interactive Symphony Concert

Children from six area counties will play recorders along with West Michigan Symphony

MUSKEGON, MI, April 5, 2018—West Michigan Symphony (WMS) is a longstanding participant in Link Up, the internationally-acclaimed music education program provided by Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute. More than 4,000 students in third through fifth grades, representing 54 schools in six counties, will attend the culminating concert on Tuesday, April 24 at the Frauenthal Center. This life-changing event often serves as a first concert experience and provides students with the opportunity to apply musical concepts they have studied throughout the school year. The concert is participatory, including segments where they play the recorder along with the orchestra from their seats.

For more than 30 years, Link Up has paired orchestras with students to explore orchestral repertoire and fundamental musical skills, including creative work and composition, through a hands-on curriculum. Link Up addresses the need for music instruction and resources by providing a free, high quality, year-long curriculum that teachers can implement, along with classroom materials, online video and audio resources, and the professional development and support necessary to engage the students.

WMS was a pioneering orchestra in joining Link Up in 2003, when Carnegie Hall first offered it to orchestras outside the New York City region. Today it is one of 100 organizations worldwide chosen for this program. Over 50,000 West Michigan students have participated in the past 14 seasons.

WMS is a professional orchestra with an annual core series of eight subscription concerts held in Muskegon’s historic Frauenthal Center. WMS also operates The Block, an intimate concert space presenting 12 annual concerts from classical, to jazz, to folk. Its Music Director, Scott Speck, has achieved worldwide acclaim as a conductor of symphony, opera and ballet performances. Speck is the co-author of the best-selling Classical Music for Dummies, and specializes in an informal, welcoming environment at concerts, often talking from the podium and providing interesting insights into the music.

In addition to Link Up, WMS’ education programs include Click Clack Moosic for children ages 3-7 and their families; the hands-on Instrument Petting Zoo, where children touch, hold and try out instruments; the Children’s Choir for ages 8 – 11; and Debut Strings for beginning and intermediate string students.

Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute produces an extraordinary range of education and social impact programs each season that extend outside the physical walls of the concert halls. These programs will reach over half a million people around the globe during the 2017–2018 season.