As you all know (via the forms sent home before Thanksgiving Break), the Powell Orchestras and Bands will be performing our Winter Concert Thursday, December 8th at 6:30PM for parents and families. The following day, Friday December 9th, the students will perform the program at school for their peers. The dress code for the concert is black pants or dresses (no short skirts please) and white dress shirts. If your child would like to wear a nice (not a t-shirt) red or green shirt or sweater, that works for me. On the night of the December 8th concert, each student must be in the Orchestra Room ready to tune by the latest 6:00PM. This is extremely important to their success in the performance!
The program of the concert is...
K-1 & 2-3 Combined Orchestra: Twas The Night Before Christmas (with soon to be announced narrator) 4-5 Orchestra: Pachelbel - Canon in D Major (1680)
Thank you all so much for you and your students hard work this semester and I hope you enjoy the concert next Thursday!
2nd and 3rd Grade Orchestra
For those of you interested in practicing the fingerings for Mary Had A Little Lamb...here they are:
Mi - Re - Do - Re - Mi - Mi - Mi Re - Re - Re Mi - Mi - Mi Mi - Re - Do - Re - Mi - Mi - Mi - Mi Re - Re - Mi - Re - Do
I wanted to post a quick clarification about school owned instruments. If your child is using one of the instruments from the school, the take home policy from now on is that he or she may take it home over the weekend. This gives them Saturday, Sunday, and Monday (because Orchestra is Tuesday - Friday). If you would like your child to take it home during the weekend, send me an email or a letter and I will make it happen :). Of course, if your child has a rental or purchased instrument, this does not apply.
Additionally, we have had a few students forget to bring their instruments on a regular basis. There will be grade deductions for participation because, without their instrument, they cannot participate. This policy of only bringing home school instruments on the weekends will insure that your student does not have to drag their violin or viola to school everyday and will have a lesser chance of forgetting it at home.
Thanks so much, Mr. Rankin
First Week of Orchestra!
Hello Parents and Students,
Welcome to the first week of orchestra at Powell Elementary! We've got a whole bunch of fun and interesting activities planned for this school year and I'm looking forward to experiencing them all with you and your children.
I've gotten a few questions regarding whether to rent, buy, or borrow (from the school) a violin, viola, or cello. Fear no more! There are only a few instruments that are in good condition that the school owns. However, after taking inventory on whether students own, rent, or need to borrow instruments, roughly 3 to 4 students might need to share instruments and take them home every other day if need be.
If you are looking to rent or buy a violin, viola, or cello, there are a great deal of fantastic local music shops in the Raleigh/Cary area. A link to three shops are in the resources page of this website and listed below. I took measurements of each student that does not own or rent their own instrument to see what size instrument they will need. If you need more information about what size to purchase or rent (or if you have any questions in general) please feel free to email me.
Here are three good music shops in the area that have rental or rent to own options: