Solo and Ensemble Contest Details, Sat. Feb 4

The schedule is posted for solo and ensemble participants. Find your time slot for solo/ensemble here.

• This year's event will be held at Roosevelt High School.
• Talk to your accompanist about practice times and warm ups for your session.
• Remember to make arrangements to pay your accompanist.
• Clothing should be "business attire", on the dressier side.
• Families are welcome to attend and watch the performers.

*At this time, we do not have room assignments, but this information will be available prior to Saturday. Be sure to plan ahead with your small ensemble for meeting times and places. Give yourself plenty of time to find parking so that you will have time to find your warm up room and prepare.

If you have an outstanding balance for the entry fee, please submit your payment asap ($22/solo; $32 per ensemble, check made to BPAB). All payments can be turned in to the BPAB mailbox in the black box. Please make sure to clearly label your payment.

Mattress Sale This Sunday, February 5 - One Day Only!

This Sunday, February 5 we will be hosting our 4th annual Mattress Fundraiser in the BHS Commons from 10 am to 5 pm. This one-day sale features top brand mattresses, pillows, sheets, and more from Simmons Beautyrest, Therapedic, Englander, and more. The prices are well below retail because they order directly from the manufacturer, there's no retail space overhead, and advertising expenses are minimal. Plus, they deliver! (Or you can pick up your mattress for free three weeks after the event, at school).

Please help us spread the word!

• Facebook event: https://bit.ly/Beds4Ballard23
• Indicate that you're going to the event - we earn extra $$ through the fundraising company if we get over 250 people to join!
• Invite all your friends so they can help us hit our goal!
• Share on your newsfeed and ask people to do the same! 
• Hand out this form and ask people to fill out if they plan to attend so your student can get credit for the sale
• Watch this short video: CFS Mattress Fundraiser.mp4 on Vimeo
• Check out the company's website: www.CFSBeds.com

Want additional information about the event? Check out the FAQs, reach out to cfsteamseattle@gmail.com or text (360) 454-3210, or contact Kris Bulson at bpabfundraising@gmail.com.

Welcome to Our New BPA Sponsors

Happy 2023 and the Year of the Rabbit! This year is predicted to be one of hope and prosperity and the rabbit is considered a lucky symbol. So far, Ballard Performing Arts has been right in line as we have many events planned and several new sponsors to welcome. We are thrilled to add Kerf Design and Quantum Consulting to our group. Look for their names and logos on our communications.

We would love to add more local businesses to our program. Please contact Cynthia Kemp at bpabsponsorships@gmail.com for more info.

The 64th Annual Spaghetti Dinner - Sat. Feb 11

Don’t miss the 64th Annual Spaghetti Dinner, on Saturday, February 11 from 5:30-8:30 pm.

Unforgettable One Hit Wonders performed by our amazing BPA groups will not only get you “Hooked on a Feeling”, but you also might be “Walking on Sunshine” or “Dancing in the Moonlight” by the end of the night! 

Get Your Spaghetti Dinner Tickets to Avoid the Lines!

Admission is free, but make it an easy night by purchasing dinner tickets online now! Dinner includes spaghetti (gluten free available), sauce (veggie or meat), bread, salad, a beverage (lemonade, water or coffee), and a small dessert.   

Feeling the LOVE from our local stores!

Thank you to our food donors (to date):

• Ground beef provided by Better Meats
• Sausage provided by Cascioppo Brothers
• Pasta provided by Ken’s Market Greenwood
• Assorted food items provided by Trader Joe’s Ballard
• Bread provided by Macrina and Sea Wolf Bakeries
• Veggies provided by Top Banana.
• Ice cream provided by Full Tilt

Ticket prices

• Adult: $16
• Senior/Student: $11
• All You Can Eat (any age): $24 
• Small dessert included.

Tickets aren't required to enjoy the amazing performances, only if you would like dinner. 

Online ticket sales are available until Friday, February 10 at 5 pm. After that, tickets are for sale at the door, while supplies last.

BRING CASH FOR THE 50/50 RAFFLE! 

Bring cash for a chance to win half the pot of our 50/50 raffle! $5/ticket or 5 tickets for $20. Cash works great at the bake sale too! 

Performance Schedule

Here is an updated performance schedule:

5:40 Jazz Lab Ensemble - Pick Up the Pieces - Average White Band

5:50 Treble Choir - Cups - Anna Kendrick from Pitch Perfect

6:00 Symphonic Orchestra - All About that Bass - Meghan Trainer

6:10 Big Band - Happy - Pharrell Williams

6:20 Fiddlers - Mystery Medley

6:30 *Advanced Chorale - Walking on Sunshine - Katrina and the Waves

6:40 Concert Band - I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) - The Proclaimers

6:55 Tenor/Bass Ensemble - Dancing in the Moonlight - King Harvest

7:05 Brass Band - Feel It Still - Portugal the Man

7:15 Chamber Choir - It’s Raining Men - The Weather Girls

7:25 Symphonic Band - Take On Me - Ah-Ha

7:40 Vocal Jazz - Somebody That I Used to Know - Gotye

7:50 Chamber Orchestra - Hooked On a Feeling - Blue Swede

8:00 Wind Ensemble/Chamber Orchestra (with guest vocalists) - Little Talks - Monsters and Men

8:10 *Concert Choir - I’ll Be There for You - The Rembrandts

8:20 Secret Garden Cast - House on a Hill

8:30 Start clean-up 

*Note that Advanced Chorale and Concert Choir have switched times.

Students should arrive 20 minutes before their performance time. Students need to buy a ticket to enjoy the Spaghetti Dinner and are encouraged to sign up for a volunteer shift after their performances. Chamber Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, Concert Choir, and Secret Garden Cast members are required to stay until the end to help clean-up.

This is truly a community event. We need LOTS of volunteers (before, during, and after) to make it a successful night. Students, family members, alums…all are encouraged to help out! Sign up here!

Group Photos

The photos that were taken of each music group in December are online and ready to order! Click here to see and order the photos.

Note: You might be prompted to enter an access code in a pop-up window. We were not given one, but if you want to order multiple photos, add them to your cart and return to the original link to order each additional photos.

Band

Jan 25 Pizza and Pep Night

Pizza and Pep with our upcoming 8th graders was a great success. We had many students attend get to know a bit more about our great program. If you know of any 8th graders that missed out on the opportunity, please have them reach out if there are any questions.

Solo and Ensemble Festival - Feb 4 @Roosevelt High School

Solo and Ensemble Festival will take place on Saturday, Feb 4 at Roosevelt High School. Here is a link to the solo/ensemble performance schedule: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ba7TGbMX93iGTR_Eh3LXO3Az4c1WpbbX/view?usp=share_link

All students in Wind Ensemble have registered with an ensemble (a few students may also be doing solo competition). Students are responsible for their own transportation. If you have not yet submitted a check for fees, please do so at your earliest convenience ($22 for a solo, $32 per ensemble payable to Ballard Performing Arts). 

Clark College Jazz Bands Trip

Both Lab Band and Ballard Big Band attended the Clark College Jazz Festival this past weekend. While the band didn’t place, they had a terrific performance. Congratulations to the outstanding jazz musician award winners Luca Rios, Simon Skonieczny, Jacob Chen, and Connor Selleck.

Be the Ultimate Band Booster – Become a Band Rep!

Our band rep and jazz band reps both have seniors this year and we need to find new parent band representative liaisons to help Mr. Gillespie communicate with families, help organize field trips, and support marching band. Sharing this role with another parent is a great way to go and it’s a super fun volunteer position. We’re hoping to find volunteers for next year now to shadow our reps the last part of the year to learn the ropes. Contact Carol at bpabbandrep@gmail.com.

Choir

Solo and Ensemble Contest Details

A few reminders before next weekend's event:

• Check the schedule for your allotted time: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xVVRVZE8Z3LZiyahShFgAAcf-vN_lQ-18qSEr5ygXu0/edit?usp=sharing
• Remember this year's event will be held at Roosevelt High School.
• Talk to your accompanist about practice times and warm ups for your session.
• Remember to make arrangements to pay your accompanist.
• Clothing should be "business attire," on the dressier side.
• Families are welcome to attend and watch the vocalists.

*At this time, we do not have room assignments, but this information will be available prior to Saturday.

Thank you!

A huge thank you goes out to our community who held choir together during a difficult time, including Serena, our fearless accompanist, the clinicians, and volunteers who helped things run smoothly. 

Also, way to go students for stepping up, keeping a positive attitude, and staying true to yourselves.  

Visiting vocal coaches

Miriam Anderson (conductor at Seattle Girls Choir, Puget Soundworks, and Seattle Labor Chorus) and Justin Birchell (doctoral choral conducting student at UW and accomplished singer) will be working with Chamber Choir, Tenor Bass Ensemble, and Concert Choir in the following weeks.

We will have a special guest work with Chamber Choir on Wednesday, Feb. 1. Jessica French, a Seattle-based composer, singer, and educator, will come to coach Chamber Choir on her piece "O Star of Strength," which the choir will sing at the Solo/Ensemble contest.

Orchestra

Symphonic Orchestra at Wintergrass February 25-26th – Chaperones Needed!

Chaperones are needed for the Symphonic Orchestra rehearsals on Saturday, February 25th at the Wintergrass festival (times below). Chaperones must complete the SPS volunteer forms and will receive free entry to the performance on Sunday. If you are interested in chaperoning, please contact bpaborchestrarep@gmail.com.

Wintergrass schedule:

Saturday, 2/25 - Arrive/check in at Lake Washington Room at Bellevue Westin by 9:45 am, End of day at 4:00 pm (bring a lunch).

Sunday, 2/26 – Arrive at Grand Ballroom by 8:00 am, concert at 10:45 am, end of concert ~12:15 pm.

Students/families will need to provide their own travel. Mr. Valdez can help facilitate carpools if necessary.

Chamber Orchestra Trip to Central Washington University Orchestra Festival March 11th

Chamber Orchestra has been accepted to the Central Washington University Orchestra Festival! The orchestra will perform, work with a clinician, listen to other high school orchestras, and listen to the CWU Orchestra perform.

Schedule:

• Meet at Ballard HS –10:00 am. Bring a lunch to eat on the bus or when we arrive at CWU (Ellensburg). We’ll have some time to get situated and find our warm up space when we arrive.
• Performance time – 1:40 pm.
• CWU Orchestra Concert – 3:30 pm.
• We will depart after the concert at about 4:30 pm.

Theatre

Have a question about Theatre/Language Arts classes that meet during the school day? Email Mr. Riley’s substitute, Ms. Charlotte Alexander at caalexander1@seattleschools.org.

The Secret Garden Musical Production Update

Students and the crew are staying in touch via GroupMe and the cast calendar. 

For questions contact director Eia Waltzer at eiaradio@yahoo.com.

How Theatre Families Can Help Support the Musical

The director and production team for the musical will reach out soon to families of theatre students with a list of ways that the BPA Boosters can support the musical. Stay tuned for more news on this next week. Until then, please sell advertisements and sponsorships for the program. Payments for advertisements and sponsorships should be in the form of a check to Ballard Performing Arts and handed in to the payment box at school for BPAB treasurer, Jill Hansen. 

Download the sponsorship form.

Download the advertising form.

Completed forms can to handed to stage manager, Max, or emailed to bpabevents@gmail.com.

Buy your tickets and save your seats – tickets are on sale now!

The district only pays for teachers’ salaries; everything else we have to raise or donate.

Save the Date: Dine out at Duke’s! On February 16



Another opportunity to eat for BPA! Dine in at Duke’s Chowder House at Greenlake, or order take out at any time on Thursday February 16th. A generous percentage of Duke’s (Greenlake) profits for the day will be donated to BPA. This offer does not apply to other Duke’s restaurants, so make sure you go to Greenlake. There’s no code to use, but please tell your server that you are there to support BPA.

Spaghetti Dinner Help Needed

Join our team of volunteers! We're about halfway to meeting our goals for spaghetti dinner volunteers. Please take a look at the sign up genius here: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/20f084fa9a92caaf85-2023#/ and see how you can help. We have about 70 spots still to fill. The most urgent positions are food line servers. We also need greeters, dishwashers, ice cream scoopers, beverage stockers, table bussers, ticket takers/ticket sales, and post-show wrap up. Many of these are short and easy shifts for students, family members, alums…all welcome! Students can earn service learning hours.

Help Cook the Special Sauce!

Freshman/Sophomore parents we need you! In order to carry on the Spaghetti Dinner tradition, we especially need some freshman and sophomore parents to join our kitchen team to learn how to make our special sauce. A dedicated alum parent, Gary Thomas, has generously agreed to come back this year to serve as our mentor cook. You don’t even need to know how to cook…he will teach you everything you need to know! Can’t stay the whole time? No problem, find someone to split the shift with you. Want to watch your child perform? No problem, cooks can take breaks! Sign up to be a lead cook here!

Social Media Help Wanted

Social media has become integral to all aspects of Ballard Performing Arts. Our students are ramping up with performances, trips, and visiting specialists.You can help highlight programs, get the word out about dine-outs, concerts, events, and fundraising, and use social media tools to tell the story of our fundraising efforts through reels, stories, and posts. The social media team needs you! You'll post content lifted from our weekly newsletter, learn how to use the pro versions of the popular software Canva, and get the inside scoop on everything that is coming down the pike with our programs. Please reach out to Jeannette Chen at bpabsocial@gmail.com - she has a graduating senior and would love to train an enthusiastic parent who wants to keep the momentum going!

Band Reps Needed

Our band rep and jazz band reps both have seniors this year and we need to find new parent band representative liaisons to help Mr. Gillespie communicate with families, organize field trips, and support marching band. We’re hoping to find volunteers for next year now to shadow our current reps the last part of the year to learn the ropes. Contact Carol at bpabbandrep@gmail.com.

In honor of solo/ensemble coming up this weekend, check out these two videos from state competition performances.

Sax ensemble Alice and the Chipmunks

Chamber Choir

Check out past performances any time on our YouTube and Vimeo channels.