Arcadia Orchestras Make Carnegie Hall Debut
By AUSD Digital Communications Intern Avani Athavale
Arcadia High School’s Concert and Symphony Orchestra after its performance at Carnegie Hall
ARCADIA – Notably the most honored stage in the United States, Carnegie Hall has hosted a long string of decorated performers: Tchaikovsky, Gershwin, The Beatles, just to name a few. Earlier this Spring, the Arcadia High School Concert-Symphony Orchestra joined the ranks of such musicians who can proudly claim to have performed on this prestigious stage, and was the first Arcadia Unified School District ensemble to do so.
“It was so inspiring standing on that famed stage and looking out at the beautiful hall,” Josiah Chun, Double Bass section leader of the Arcadia High School Symphony Orchestra, shared. “I was nervous but the magnitude of being up on that stage felt powerful and gave me confidence.”
This is an opportunity that very few people in the world have experienced. But, the Arcadia High School Orchestras have a reputation for excellence. They are consistently ranked as “Superior” at the annual Southern California Band and Orchestra Association (SCSBOA) Festival, and, in recent years, won Sweepstakes awards at the WorldStrides Festivals in both Orlando in 2023 and San Francisco in 2024. Having amassed all of these honors for the program, Orchestra Director Pin Chen knew that she wanted to continue taking her students to further heights; the WorldStrides National Band and Orchestra Festival at Carnegie Hall was the perfect opportunity to do so.
The 4-day event brought together youth bands and orchestras from around the nation to New York City. Arcadia Orchestras qualified to participate after going through the audition process last year. Although this was not a competitive festival—meaning the ensembles did not receive any rankings—each group received valuable feedback from adjudicators from music conservatory faculty, such as from the New England Conservatory of Music, which is among the best in the nation.
“I knew that this would be an opportunity that the students would get a lot out of, and honestly, an opportunity that I never had as a high school student. And I knew that we had the caliber of students and the level of achievement in our groups to make that happen,” Chen explained.
The students took on New York City through both an educational and exploratory lens. Through touring landmarks like Radio City Music Hall, which is designated a New York City Landmark and is the home court of the Rockettes and the annual Christmas Spectacular, Carnegie Hall, and Rockefeller Center, they learned about the history of New York City, and the arts that continue to flourish there. Students also worked with clinician Dr. Tanya Chanphanitpornkit, a faculty member of Nyack High School and lecturer at Brooklyn College, on the pieces that they would be performing in Carnegie Hall.
The Arcadia Orchestra students at Hard Rock Cafe on their first night in New York City
Exploring the food in the Big Apple, the orchestra also paid a visit to Ellen’s Stardust Diner, famous for its singing waitstaff. Gavin Ngo, Orchestra Council President and Violinist in Symphony Orchestra, elaborated on his experience at this one-of-a-kind diner.
“It was very, very memorable, considering that I love to do karaoke, so I was singing while eating. I honestly couldn't really eat much, considering the fact that I was singing most of the time!” he exclaimed.
The third day of the trip was the moment that most had been awaiting: the Carnegie Hall performance. Before standing up to the podium, Chen advised her students to “take a moment and take it all in.” She told them that they would be among the very few that would ever see the precious view of the curvilinear levels, deep red and gold-trimmed seats, and the signature domed ceilings that help even out the acoustics in the hall. After drinking it in, it was clear that students had a new energy about them. Carnegie Hall is unlike any other venue that Arcadia Orchestras have played in: each note, good or bad, in Carnegie Hall can be heard with exceeding clarity, and each musical phrase is only heightened by the brilliant acoustics.
When speaking about the hall and the experience, Ngo shared that it showed him “just how good music could really make you feel,” and that, in the aftermath of the concert, he has been more motivated to improve “because of the joy that music has over [him].”
The Concert-Symphony Orchestra Bass Section posing for a selfie before performing at Carnegie Hall (Photo Courtesy of Josiah Chun)
The feedback received from the adjudicators at the festival has also inspired concrete change in the day-to-day rehearsal activities in Room P103 at Arcadia High. Chen spoke about how one adjudicator compared an orchestra to a locomotive train—some having the engine at the front, “push-and-pull” trains having engines on both ends, and others having them in the middle and throughout. Chen has been using this analogy to switch up the seating arrangement in daily rehearsals, seating different people at the front of the section each day, and advising section leaders to disperse themselves into the middle or back of the section. She hopes that this new style of leadership will “encourage everyone to contribute, no matter if they have a title of principal or not-principal. She added that if they all “have that same mentality, then the entire train is going to be able to move together.”
Reflecting on the journey that has brought Arcadia Orchestras this far, Chen credited some of the success of the Orchestra program to the community and district support that goes towards prioritizing music education in Arcadia Unified schools.
“One thing I know that is quite different for a Southern California orchestra is that we've never had orchestra be cut ever since the school opened in 1952,” Chen said. “Some districts cut music entirely, which is a travesty, but fortunately, the Arcadia community has always valued and understood how important music education is to students and to the community.”
It is this support that inspires Chen to continue innovating and thinking about new opportunities to expose her students to. She shared that her future goals for the program include attending music conferences in Sacramento and Chicago, a festival in Indiana, and even an international trip to Europe. It will be a pleasure to see where the Arcadia Orchestras locomotive goes next.