Ponte Vedra resident and Jacksonville Country Day School fifth-grader Lynn Ibrahim performed in the Florida Music Education Association All-State Orff Ensemble on Jan. 13-14.
The All-State Orff Ensemble is an audition-based elite performance group for elementary school students that has been around for many years. This year, the Orff Ensemble was composed of 78 students from across the state of Florida.
The guest conductors were Michael Chandler and Ben Torress, who teaches elementary music in Tennessee. They also led workshops and teacher education courses in the Orff Schulwerk pedagogy.
Lynn and her peers prepared nine pieces of music for the concert. Students rotated parts between each piece.
Throughout the performance, Lynn played alto and xylophone and performed as a mover (someone who takes part in a creative dance movement) and sang on the risers.
Each piece included various elements of the Orff Schulwerk music pedagogy. There was singing, movement, xylophones, ukulele and recorder woven throughout the concert. All solos and movement pieces were student-composed during rehearsals.
“It took several weeks to practice for the audition,” said Lynn. “I was looking at videos and studying the music for hours.”
Lynn first learned how to read music when she was 5 years old and began playing the piano and saxophone around that age, too. She soon branched out to singing, playing the xylophone and learning rhythmic movements to pair with musical pieces.
Jacksonville Country Day School music specialist Jessica Barker saw her playing the xylophone in class and encouraged her to audition for the ensemble.
“It was really fun and a unique experience,” said Lynn. “It felt like I was doing something really important. Music is my passion. I still don’t really know what I want to do when I grow up because there are so many options, but I do know I will always have music in my life.”
