PORT TOWNSEND — The Port Townsend Youth Chorus — a troupe of 21 talented students ages 10 through 13 — are the featured performers at this month’s Port Townsend Friends Meeting.
The meetings convene the second Saturday of each month at the Meetinghouse, 1841 Sheridan St.
Saturday’s events will begin at 7 p.m. with a dessert social. The Youth Chorus will take the stage at 7:30 p.m.
There is a suggested donation of $5 to $50 with no one turned away for inability to pay. The money is used to pay for the meetinghouse.
For more information, call Hazel Johnson at 360-385-6000 or visit ptquaker.org/.
The Youth Chorus features motivated young singers led by local teacher and performer Leslie Lewis, the group’s director since 1995.
The group manages the rigors of performing for the public and also continuously learns the important skills of reading music, developing harmony singing, exploring new styles of music, observing performance ritual and etiquette, and most of all developing a love of the art form and how to work as an artistic team, Lewis said.
The Youth Chorus is joined by accompanist Diane Thompson on piano.
Thompson is well known locally for her involvement as a past director and accompanist for the Port Townsend Community Chorus.
The Chorus will perform a variety of songs in its segment, including “Pie Jesu” by Mary Lynn Lightfoot, composed in memory of the children who died in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.
Also on the program is an African-American spiritual and protest song arranged by Rollo Dilworth, “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around.”
That will be followed by a performance from three older teenage students led by Sydney Keegan.
The three teens — Clarice Forbes, Owen Brummel and Diana Bond — have been studying the vocal arts with Keegan for up to four years.
Bond and Forbes are both seniors at Port Townsend High School and Brummel is a sophomore at Chimacum High School.
The two senior girls have been very involved in musical drama.
These performers will be accompanied by Helen Lauritzen and Hazel Johnson.
