The school year may be coming to a close, but opportunities for kids to participate and learn about the arts don’t end when the bell rings. Many arts-related summer camps are gearing up for the summer season.
Central Florida Vocal Arts has a program for underserved kids from Orange and Osceola County School Districts that now stretches past the school year. The program’s called 1:1, said as “One to One,” and it pairs the kids with their very own vocal coach. The two work together all school year, participating in a state competition halfway through and a public recital at the end.
And Central Florida Vocal Arts Director of Education Molly Nicholson says the 1:1 program now offers scholarships into the organization’s Summer Institute.
During the school year, the voice lessons happen virtually during the student’s choir class.
Nicholson, a 1:1 teacher herself, said there’s much more to these voice lessons than mastering the technical aspects of singing.
“It’s very important that a voice teacher and their student get to know each other better,” said Nicholson. “Singing is such a vulnerable experience. Our instrument is our body. Our voice is our instrument. Using our voices is so special…we're sharing our soul. So those first few lessons, it's a lot more talking than singing, and really understanding the students.”
And the students use the courage and confidence they learn in the program throughout other aspects of their lives, whether they ultimately pursue music as a career or not.
“We've had diverse journeys across the board, but one of our seniors that just graduated, he started the program from sixth grade and graduated this year,” Nicholson said, “so he was our very first student that made it all the way through the program, and he's going off to study musical theater and vocal performance, and we are so excited to see where he ends up.”
Nicholson said students in the 1:1 program are now offered scholarships to Central Florida Vocal Arts’ Summer Institute, which is open to the public as well. “It is a very special six days where we bring in students, and right away they jump into training about auditioning and writing a script, and they're assigned roles, and they're learning an original musical that we all write together,” Nicholson said. The kids perform the musical at the end of the week, along with a separate vocal recital for every student.
“What is incredible about that is we've had students come in on Monday being a bit shy, but by the end of the week, they are center stage, ready to sing that solo or dance and just be the star,” said Nicholson.
And that’s part of why she does this work to help make the arts accessible for everyone, she said. “Our lives are so musical that bringing it into the communities that might not have access to it is enriching the souls of everyone, and that's something that is just so important to us, because it brings positivity to your life.”
