American Young_Voices

Ally's music teacher signed up the 5th graders to participate in American Young Voices. AYV as its known is am international music program where students from around the world learn songs and perform them in a concert with students from other schools.

Our local event was in Lowell, a small city about an hour away. About 25 of her classmates left school on Monday afternoon at 1pm and traveled by bus to Lowell they rehearsed with the group and the concert was at 7pm.

It was a full fledged concert with professional musicians. Pretty amazing experience for all the kids. Ally had a blast. We then picked her up at school at 1030pm Monday night. And yes she went to school on Tuesday at her usual 7:30AM drop off.

 We spotted Ally in the stands among her classmates - but there were about 3000 students from all over Massachusetts there. Can you see Ally?

 She is to the right of her friend Ellie - Ellie is wearing a turquoise sweatshirt.

Becky took a couple of really neat panoramic pictures. 

At one point the conductor had the audience get up and salsa dance in the stands. With the Amigos parents that was a huge hit. 

I took it as an opportunity to take more pictures and zoom in on Ally while singing. From our seats she was blocked by the conductor so we couldn't actually see her.

There was a trio of beat boxers who performed as well as a solo singer. It was quite a concert.

Ally likes the picture above because her friend Cathal (seated on the other side of her has his arms up cheering) She was also seated around Cata, Ale, Boden, Clemens, Erik & Theo.

Becky and I thought the best part was watching the kids have fun together. It was a great experience for them. Ally's school is the only k-8 in our district so she and her fellow 5th graders stay in our building and start middle school together as a cohort, just the 44 of them. It really is a nice group of kids and families.

we are all pretty tired though! If you want the video links just email me and I will send them to you.