Project Wichita!

Just finished a 6-day marathon of a show choir camp near Wichita, Kansas. The culmination was a 2-hour performance by nearly 250 kids that we all worked with for the past week putting together full-length shows. While some kids certainly struggled, as is always the case in these camps, I was completely knocked over by the level of talent we witnessed onstage!

Butler Community College is never going to be on a "most scenic campus" listing, but this campus in the middle of virtually nowhere hosted one of the best events of its kind in the USA. It wasn't just lip service, the focus at this camp was genuinely on the kids and their growth. Growth as singers, growth as dancers, growth in confidence, growth in respect, and growth toward becoming confident and more mature young adults.

I've never been thanked so many times, had so many pictures taken with students, had as many kids come up to me with tears in their eyes to say goodbye, or handed as many heartfelt thank-you notes. And I was just one of the clinicians this was happening to, as everywhere you looked after the final show stood a clinician with a line of sweaty, teary-eyed students waiting to thank and hug them.

Too many times I become a bit jaded and hardened in my profession. Yes, the focus is on kids, but it's also on winning, making finals, getting recognition, enhancing my "street cred", whatever that means. This week reminded me that I LOVE to teach kids to perform and get excited about lights coming on as their souls awaken. This week there was no competition or awards, but simply a bunch of professionals coming together to bring some magic to kids' lives.

In addition to me, the elite staff of clinicians included a well-known professional a capella singer, a dance instructor with Duke University, the organizer of the FAME competition series, a doctor of music from Temple University, a former Miss Kansas, 2 of the top show choir directors in America, a recent inductee to the Nebraska Music Hall of Fame, and a Radio City Rockette!!! In addition, the entire week was kicked off by a concert by Christian singer Mark Schultz (Letters From War, He's My Son), and a luncheon with NY Times best-selling author Gracia Burnham. I'm humbled, blessed, and appreciative to have been deemed worthy of calling these folks my colleagues for the week.

I was a pebble tossed into the pond with a lot of pebbles more impressive than me. I pray that our ripples carry through the water of these children's lives, and that lifelong memories of joy and inspiration came from all of us. Some of these kids WILL be heard from someday as singers and dancers, and I'm privileged to have played my tiniest of parts in bringing them along.