Brick Students To Join 6,000 Voices In Massive Choir Event

A group of chorus students from Midstreams Elementary School are scheduled to join 6,000 other students next week for a massive choir event at the Prudential Center.

The American Young Voices concert, which made its debut at the Prudential Center in 2015, will bring together more than 6,000 students from the New Jersey, New York and Connecticut areas for the concert, double the number who participated in 2015, according to a news release from the Young Voices organization.

The concert on Thursday, May 26 will feature students from more than 100 schools who will sing with a live band in a professional setting. World-renowned conductor Francisco J. Núñez, the founder and artistic director of the Young People’s Chorus of New York City, will lead the choir for the second straight year.

“It’s really amazing to see Young Voices thrive in the U.S.,” Ben Lewis, the managing director of Young Voices, said. “We’ve seen children from all over the world develop a new love of music through this program. We’re very excited to continue growing and expanding across America.”

“I’m thrilled to be involved with this amazing program for a second year, especially since the number of students participating has doubled from last year! Young Voices really boosts a love of music in a child, as well as helps to raise their level of self-esteem,” said American Young Voices conductor Francisco J. Núñez.

American Young Voices is not a competition, but an all-inclusive program designed to encourage children in grades 2 through 8 from all backgrounds to realize the power of music. The teachers spend months preparing their students during their choral or general music classes for the main event.

Young Voices began more than 20 years ago in Cardiff, Wales, as an attempt to stage the world’s largest all-male choir in concert history, which earned a place in the Guinness Book of World Records. The success of the show inspired founder David Lewis to put on other concerts and in 1995, he started to receive letters and phone calls from children asking why there were no choir events for young people. In response, Lewis agreed to stage a series of children’s concerts. Now 20 years later, more than 1 million students have participated in sold-out Young Voices concerts across the United Kingdom.

In the United States, Young Voices supplements participating schools’ music education curriculum based on the National Core Music Standards, according to information from American Young Voices.

"Teachers are provided with teaching aims and objectives in inquiry-based format, all materials including scores and recordings, as well as other resources and support for their music programs. Music is chosen to be fun and accessible to students of various age groups, backgrounds, and abilities, from classrooms to general music classes to choral ensembles," the organization says.

"The music is specially arranged to engage and inspire students’ personal successes, increase team building and build a diverse skill set of listening skills and overall appreciation of the arts," it said.

For information on how to attend this year’s concert and get local students involved in the 2017 event, please visit AmericanYoungVoices.com.