Friends, family and a few special guests crowded into Tappan Middle School’s gymnasium Wednesday morning for a preview of the music program’s ‘I Have a Dream’ 50th Celebration Concert, which will be performed June 13 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
Tappan’s eighth-grade choir, band and orchestra each played three pieces separately. They came together at the end of the concert and played two pieces as an ensemble. For the final song, ‘We Shall Overcome’, eighth-graders not in the music program joined the choir in singing. The program played Wednesday is the same program that will be played in Washington D.C. at the National Mall.
Tappan’s eighth-grade class has taken a trip to Washington D.C. since about 1990, said social studies instructor Elaine Richmond. But this year, those in the music program will have the unique opportunity to participate in a one-hour concert with musicians from around the country in the National Parks Service’s series of concerts held to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech.
“We’re extremely excited about this opportunity,” band director Frederick Smith said. “We just wanted to share with the students something real, something tangible, and something that they will remember.”
Smith said that the music program has been preparing for the upcoming trip since the end of the spring concert cycle.
“The pieces we are performing for D.C. are a new program and for a middle school, that is pretty challenging,” Smith said. “We’ve had a few joint rehearsals and have been practicing individually, but all of this has been in lieu of our own concert schedules so it has not been easy.”
Even with the hectic practice schedule Smith said he is confident the music program will be ready for the performance. The preview acted as a run-through as well as an opportunity for community members and family to see the concert if they can’t make it to D.C.
In the audience on Wednesday was composer Jonathan Bruce Brown who wrote ‘Legacy of Vision: Martin Luther King’, which is a part of the program being played in D.C. The piece is an arrangement, which includes choir, band, orchestra, and a narrator who reads excerpts of Dr. King’s speech. Smith will act as narrator in the piece.
Brown thanked the group for celebrating the anniversary of such an important speech with his music and wished them luck on their trip.
“It strikes me that something like this is what music is all about. It’s about bringing people together,” Brown said.
Also in attendance was Smith’s mother who traveled from North Carolina in order to see the show. It was her first time seeing her son conduct in person. Lucy William Smith had worked with Dr. King and so the show was very moving for her, she said.
“I cherish what time has brought,” Lucy Smith said. “The road we travel is hard sometimes, but this is where we’ve come and I’m proud of that. This concert reminds me where we have come from.”
Smith jumped at the opportunity to have the music program perform while on their trip. He said it is a great way for the students to engage with history.
“The students are already gaining a lot of knowledge about civil rights, different connections, and the diversity of our community,” Smith said. “We hope that this performance will bring all of that to life for them.”
In order to make the trip possible a fundraising effort was put forward to pay for the rental of larger instruments, chairs, stands, a PA system, and shirts. Martine Perreault and Meena Singh, parents of students at Tappan Middle School, worked to gather community and corporate sponsors. While Perreault and Singh do not have 8th graders, they took on the project because the chance to perform at Lincoln Memorial is such a good opportunity, Perreault said.
“We know that there’s a lot of support in the community,” Perreault said. “A lot of the time it just takes letting people know and they’ll offer help. The content of the trip was something that a lot of businesses were willing to support.”
Money raised will also go toward helping students afford the trip. According to Perreault, no student has been excluded from the trip for financial reasons.
The music program has a week and a half to polish their performance, Smith said. Then the 190 Tappan Middle School 8th grade students going on the trip will be headed to Washington D.C. on June 11 through June 14.
Chelsea Hoedl is an intern reporter for AnnArbor.com. She can be reached at choedl@mlive.com.