Every Tuesday afternoon, in an IHS practice room, the sounds of music and laughter fill the air. Inside are fifteen to twenty student musicians playing songs ranging from Christmas carols to the soundtrack of The Nutcracker. Music Con Amore is a new club at IHS, founded this fall as a charity group bringing music to people who don’t usually have access to it. The club hopes to use music to inspire and bring joy to its audiences.
The president of Music Con Amore, Lizzie Huang ’27, was inspired to start this club when exploring senior home options for her own grandmother. “When visiting, I saw lots of residents who looked alone and bored,” she said. Wanting to address the lack of excitement that many senior residents experience, Lizzie turned to her passion—music—for a solution. Lizzie plays piano and clarinet in the IHS Wind Ensemble, and as a musician, she believes that music could be a helpful strategy to reconnect with and bring some excitement to the senior residents at these homes.
The name Music Con Amore comes from Italian, meaning music “with love” or “with healing.” Deeply passionate about the club’s mission, Lizzie put in hours of hard work to find officers and a faculty advisor, Barbara Bergman, and create posters to recruit members. “As a sophomore, starting a club was hard because I personally didn’t know how to run a club and how much work needed to be put in,” she said. “It meant a lot to me when fellow musicians with the same ideas as me showed up to make it happen.”
Music Con Amore is planning an upcoming performance at Beechtree Nursing Home in Ithaca. They hope to perform at other local senior homes, like Kendall and Longview, and eventually partner with a few nursing homes for year-round performances. About twenty dedicated members play in the ensemble, and the officers are busy scheduling performances, getting field trip forms, and ensuring everyone has the right music. The club is hoping to recruit more members and raise awareness about its goals in the coming years.
Music Con Amore welcomes all musicians of any instrument and skill level. The club officers work diligently to find parts for all instruments through transposition and other methods. Their goal is to encourage as many students as possible to join, allowing the club to pursue its mission of bringing music to all. Through the dedication of Music Con Amore’s officers and members, the club aspires to bring joy and excitement to others through music.
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