The Gold Medal winning South Florida Youth Symphony, one of the nation’s premier youth musical organizations, will perform at the prestigious Carnegie Hall National Instrumental Festival in New York City, Feb. 23-26, 2018 — if it can raise the funds.
“There’s an old joke about the musician, instrument in hand, asking a man on the street for directions to Carnegie Hall,” said Marjorie Hahn, the SFYS musical and executive director. “His answer: practice, practice, practice. We’ll do plenty of practicing, but we’ll also have to do a lot of fundraising, fundraising, fundraising.”
As many as 30-35 musicians from the SFYS, which won the Gold Medal in January at the prestigious Heritage Music Festival in Washington, DC, are expected to make the trip at an estimated cost of $40,000. The trip includes: staying in a Manhattan hotel, a Broadway show, a tour of either the Empire State Building or Statue of Liberty, and a 30-minute performance on the Carnegie Hall stage.
Now in its 52nd year, the South Florida Youth Symphony — which has never turned away a student because of his/her inability to pay — has opened a GoFundMe account to help raise the necessary funds for the once-in-a-lifetime trip.
“This will be an incredible experience for our kids,” Hahn said, noting that most of the young musicians come from the underserved area of north Miami-Dade County. “Many of these kids have never been out of Miami-Dade County, let alone on an airplane. And to play at Carnegie Hall, the mecca of musical performance in America, is the icing on the cake.”
The public can donate to the Youth Symphony’s Carnegie Hall trip via GoFundMe at www.gofundme.com/nmejn-carnegie-hall-performance; by email at MakeMusic@sfys.net or phone at 305-238-2729.
