Students get an opportunity to make music with Florida Orchestra

Michele Miller, Tampa Bay Times, 23rd October 2017

The excitement was palpable as students hopped off their school buses and streamed into the Center for the Arts at River Ridge.

“We’re packed, sold out,” said the center’s director, Rick D’Onofrio, sporting a wide grin as he guided the chattering students into their seats while members of the Florida Orchestra warmed up on stage.

Before long, the lights dimmed, and the audience settled in. D’Onofrio gave a primer on theater etiquette. Then Florida Orchestra music director Michael Francis took the stage, motioning for the orchestra, then the audience to rise before launching into the national anthem.

The Florida Orchestra is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. But for most in the seats, this was their first time hearing the group.

Those are the kids the Florida Orchestra is trying to reach.

For a $7 ticket, students throughout Pasco had the chance to partake in the traveling educational concert program, which was held on consecutive days last week, at the Center of the Arts at River Ridge and the Center for the Arts at Wesley Chapel.

“An American Celebration,” which includes an educational classroom resource packet for teachers to use in preparation for the concert, is geared to upper elementary and middle school students. The performance was immediately followed by a side-by-side concert for high school students, where selected students played along with orchestra members.

“The whole thing is totally about an educational experience for our students,” said Tom Viking, director of arts for Pasco County schools. “We’re broadening their horizons, exposing them to other things.”

Francis, the English-born maestro, was particularly engaging, integrating humor while quizzing students on the various instruments in an orchestra and introducing them to the works of composers such as Johann Strauss, Gioachino Rossini and John Philip Sousa…