Music and Performing Arts
The Quaker Valley Music Department claims to be a recipient of the “Top 100 Communities for Music Education” award. The music program offers the following performance ensembles: Marching Band, Symphonic Band, Jazz Ensemble, String Orchestra, Symphony Orchestra, Concert Choir, Chamber Singers, and male and female Barbershop Quartets. Classes include Keyboard, Music Theory I, Music Theory II, AP Music Theory, Instrumental Lessons, and History of Popular Music.
Quaker Valley High School’s performing ensembles consistently receive Excellent and Superior ratings at Pennsylvania Music Educators Association Adjudication festivals and win awards for competitions in Florida, Ohio, Virginia, and Toronto. In addition, these groups regularly offer their talents to a variety of civic events. On average, 40% of the high school student body participates in one or more of the performing ensembles.
Each spring the high school Music and Drama Departments produce a full-scale Broadway musical. Over 50 students participate on stage or behind the scenes building sets, assembling costumes, or hanging lights. Quaker Valley has presented a wide range of shows, from Oklahoma and Grease to The Pirates of Penzance and A Chorus Line, and has won numerous Gene Kelly Awards along the way (the Tony Awards of area high schools).
Students who excel in the Music Department qualify for membership in the Quaker Valley Chapter of the Tri-M National Music Honor Society. The Society recognizes students’ academic and musical achievements and provides a venue for community service in the arts. One of the membership requirements is participation in a student solo recital.
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Famous quotes containing the words performing arts, music and, music, performing and/or arts:
“More than in any other performing arts the lack of respect for acting seems to spring from the fact that every layman considers himself a valid critic.”
—Uta Hagen (b. 1919)
“And in the next instant, immediately behind them, Victor saw his former wife.
At once he lowered his gaze, automatically tapping his cigarette to dislodge the ash that had not yet had time to form. From somewhere low down his heart rose like a fist to deliver an uppercut, drew back, struck again, then went into a fast disorderly throb, contradicting the music and drowning it.”
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“The sound of tireless voices is the price we pay for the right to hear the music of our own opinions. But there is also, it seems to me, a moment at which democracy must prove its capacity to act. Every man has a right to be heard; but no man has the right to strangle democracy with a single set of vocal chords.”
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