After a long winter, The Storm King School’s Department of Visual and Performing Arts sprung into spring with three exciting events that brought the campus to life and celebrated the diverse talents of our students. The creativity began to flow in April with Storm King’s annual Spring Arts Weekend. The weekend celebrates various branches of visual, performing, and language arts and included One Act performances, a visual arts exhibition and art awards, and the 2^nd Annual Storm King Poetry Festival. The students continued to showcase their talents during the month of May with the 2018 Spring Dance Recital and the Spring Music Concert.

Here are some highlights from this year’s events:

 

SPRING ARTS WEEKEND

The 2018 Spring Arts Weekend was kicked off on the evening of Thursday, April 26, in the Walter Reade Jr. Theatre, when a small group of students got on stage to perform a series of entertaining One Act plays including La Mouche by Stephen Bittrich and Over the Moon by Lavinia Roberts that inspired laughter from the audience. The plays featured student-actors of all levels, including stage veterans Jack Besterman ‘18, Scott Rolon ‘18, Joe Dawson ‘18, and Tamar Haham ‘19, as well as Aryana Martin ‘18, Jayden Figueroa ‘19, Emmanuel Davis ‘20, Aiden Sweeney ‘19, Bridget Wickiser ‘18, Helen Shen ‘20, Conall Sweeney ‘20, Chris Chang ‘20, and Sean Witte ‘20.

Friday, April 27, focused on the visual arts when the talent of student-artists was recognized at an art exhibition and awards presentation held in Ogden Hall. Students from all art classes offered at SKS displayed their works, and each category had a winner judged by a panel of SKS faculty members.

 

Art Award recipients included Jeewara Jarearnphan ’20 in Drawing for her charcoal sketch Pomegranate; Zhoushi Ichabod Ren ’18 in Painting for Honey; Liwei Wang ‘20 in Photography; A. River Holasek ‘20 in Digital Design for a self-portrait; John Stuart Bobrow ‘21 in 3-D Construction for Wings, Max Chen ’19 in Watercolor for Owls; Emily Elizabeth Kent ’21 in Fashion for Butterfly Dress. The Best in Show Award went to Polina Shlovskaya ’18 for Classical Head and the Most Creative Award was given to Huanran Mao ‘20 for her animation.

During the exhibition, guests were also treated to a book reading by Storm King Creative Writing students. The students worked collaboratively throughout the year in real-world situations to write, illustrate, and publish their own children’s books. The readings included Cem Taviloglu ’19 – The Cowboy Frog, Owen Ng ’18 – Why Are You Worrying, Igor Zelenko ’19 – Mr. Book, Peiyu Yang ‘19- Gain or Lost, Haohui Zheng ’19 – Cake to Cupcake, Siyu Wang ’19 – The Magic Pen, Yumeng Song ’18 – The Little Pumpkin, and Songjun Ning ’18 – A Black Oval Stone.

 

 

Another important Language Arts event – the Second Annual Storm King School Poetry Festival – was held at the Walter Reade Jr. Theatre on the evening of Saturday, April 28. The festival hosted young poets from SKS and other independent schools in the region, including Poughkeepsie Day School, Rye Country Day School, New York Military Academy, Millbrook School, South Kent School, Greens Farms Academy, Beaver Country Day School, and The Gunnery School. Following opening words by Headmaster Jonathan Lamb, the event began with a student-film prepared for the School’s sesquicentennial by freshman Emily Elizabeth Kent, and lively impromptu “Slam Poetry” performed by Storm King students in the audience.

The Poetry Festival was organized by the English Department, who said they received more than 125 poetry submissions from around the region. Nineteen poems chosen as finalists were judged by Storm King alumnus and poet Mr. Steve Hirsch ’77 and Hudson Valley poet laureate Mr. Robert Milby.

 

Following an introduction of the student-poets, the judges took turns reading the poems and giving each finalist feedback. At the conclusion of the ceremony, awards were given to three finalists including Storm King’s Olivia O’Blaney ‘21 for her moving poem “Where I’m From,” Rye Country Day School’s Caitlyn Dahnke for “Four Walls,” and Beaver Country Day School’s Isabelle Aronson for “Fifteen Minutes Until Landing.” Ms. Sarah Pfeffer was presented with the Excellence in Education Award for her outstanding contributions to the English department at South Kent School and for “inspiring her 10th-grade students.”

 

SPRING DANCE RECITAL

On Thursday, May 10, sixteen Storm King student-dancers mesmerized the audience at this year’s Spring Dance Recital. Emotions were high as the students in Jeanette Jacobson’s dance class, including three graduating seniors, performed 30 dance routines for the Storm King community at the Walter Reade, Jr. Theatre.

For the opening routine, the audience was treated to On Broadway which featured all 16 dancers, including Savannah Buon ’19, Maya Buranbayev ’19, Thanyakumari Chandran ’20, Amelia Douches ’20, Maria Fedosenkova ’19, Caitlin Jones ’19, Samantha McCullough ’20, Caroline Hecht ’19, Morgan Papera ’20, Asia Raacke ’19, Shania Roehrich ’19, Allegra Walker ’19, Rory Tobin ’20, and three senior dancers Stephanie Appiah, Elizabeth Pomeroy, and Giselle Morales. The opening routine was followed by solo performances of Madness, People Help People, and Chop Kiss by the three seniors. For the rest of the show, the guests enjoyed a combination of group and solo routines choreographed to a wide range of musical genres including love songs, dance tracks, contemporary pieces, and musical theater. The show closed with all 16 dancers performing to a lively rendition of Disturbia.

 

During her opening words, an emotional Mrs. Jacobson recognized the seniors for their accomplishments during their years at Storm King. “Seeing Stephanie, Giselle, and Elizabeth perform was bittersweet,” Mrs. Jacobson explained following the show. “I enjoyed working with them so much. Choreographing their senior piece Stole the Show was a lot of fun because I was able to include some really complicated jumps and turn sets. These three girls have come so far in their years at SKS, and in my dance class. I am very sad to see them go, but I know they are well-prepared for college and beyond.”

Mrs. Jacobson continued by praising the other 13 students in her class. “I am so proud of the work all the dancers did in this particular show. For several girls, it was their first time taking a dance class, and I am so impressed with their progress and level of confidence this year. Three of them performed solos for the first time! Watching this show transpire was very rewarding. To see the dancers smile from ear to ear as they perform makes all the hard work and late nights worthwhile.” Mrs. Jacobson also extended many thanks to Liz Connell who designed the show’s lighting and the technical crew including A. River Holasek ‘21, Zoe Stene ‘19, and Noah Mendlewski ‘20.

 

SPRING MUSIC CONCERT

On Thursday, May 25, the SKS community was treated to yet another show featuring the talent of Storm King’s talented music and voice students – this time at the Spring Music Concert. The concert was designed to showcase a year’s worth of learning and featured a series of instrumental and vocal performances from many different musical decades and genres. For graduating seniors including Jack Besterman, Scott Rolon, Elizabeth Pomeroy, Max Nie, Songjun Ning, and Yangshuo Wu, the concert was their final performance on the stage of the Walter Reade Jr. Theatre before commencement on June 2.

Following a short introduction by Visual and Performing Arts Chair John Carruthers, the first group to take the stage was a pop ensemble who performed an upbeat version of the 70s hit “September.” While the vocals of senior Elizabeth Pomeroy captured the attention of the audience, drums by Max Nie, keyboards by Liwei Wang ‘20, guitar by Songjun Ning, and bass by Zoe Stene ‘19 got everyone in the room clapping.

 

 

Junior vocalist Caroline Hecht, accompanied by freshmen Dominique Gooden and Emily Doles on flute, and Alex Neighbors ‘22 on saxophone, was up next. Her ethereal performances of “Ellington Medley” and “Memory” changed the mood instantly and mesmerized the crowd. After a short piano rendition of “Suzanna’s Waltz,” senior Jack Besterman sang Billy Joel’s hit “Piano Man” to the melancholy harmonica of Uzay Polat ’19.

The vocal duo of juniors David Xilong Ma and Peishan Ouyang followed with a smooth performance of Michael Jackson’s iconic song “I’ll Be There” along with their pop ensemble including Songjun Ning on guitar, Liwei Wang on keyboards, Yangshuo Wu on saxophone, and Margot Yang ’19 on drums.

A highlight of the evening was junior Asia Raacke’s impeccable solo performance of the aria “When I am laid in Earth” from the opera Dido and Aeneas followed by another beautiful solo by sophomore Morgan Papera of “Love Never Dies.” The two girls, joined by the other members of the Storm King choir including Sofia Bove ‘22, Tamar McGowan ‘19, Olivia O’Blaney ‘21, and Lin Yin Wang ‘21, continued to show off their harmonizing skills with performances of “Phantom of the Opera Medley” and Queen’s infamous “Bohemian Rhapsody.”

 

 

To conclude the concert, senior Scott Rolon, along with freshmen Victoria Smart and Emily Elizabeth Kent joined the choir along with Kylie Marshall ’21 and Songjun Ning on guitars, Jae Hyun Kim ‘20 on drums, and Zoe Stene ’19 on bass, to perform “Over and Over Again” and “This Is Me” to a clapping audience.

Congratulations and thanks go out to all of Storm King’s talented student-artists, performers, and writers for their contributions to the Arts Program, and to their teachers and for all of their hard work this year. Special thanks go to Theater Technician Liz Connell, A. River Holasek ’21, and Zoe Stene ’19 for their work on lighting and sound throughout the year.