This article was originally published in the Harker Quarterly Spring  2011 Edition

The third annual Alumni Conservatory Classic, held New Year’s Day at the Nichols Hall auditorium, reunited alumni and current students for a special series of performances.

The concert, which was run and directed by alumni, showcased the diversity and uniqueness of Harker’s performing arts students and graduates, featuring classical pieces, jazz standards and songs from musicals. All pieces were self-directed, learned and rehearsed during the winter break.

Alumni and current students collaborated on most of the songs during the show, including “Therapy” from the musical “Tick, Tick … Boom!” which featured singers D.J. Blickenstaff ’09 and Lauren Ammatuna ’08, with Benjamin Tien, grade 12, providing accompaniment on piano.

During another student-alumni collaboration for the Presto from Felix Mendelssohn’s “Octet in E-flat, Op. 20,” violinists Audrey Kwong ’07 and Helen Wu, grade 8, were accompanied by violinists Jonathan Wang ’08 and Albert Chen, grade 10, senior Warren Kwong and Stephanie Kim ’08 on viola, and Julia Shim ’10 and Melody Huang, grade 11, on cello.

For the show’s final number, past and present members of the upper school all-male vocal ensemble Guys’ Gig – Peter Combs ’04, Aseem Shukla ’07, Alex Underwood ’08, Ben Englert ’08, Amaresh Shukla ’09, Chetan Vakkalagadda ’09, Joe Hospodor ’09, Kartik Venkatraman ’09, and current seniors Kwong, Aditya Parige and Sean Martin – gathered to sing Elliott Yamin’s “Wait for You,” arranged by Vakkalagadda, and a medley of songs by various artists titled “Bm G D A II,” arranged by Venkatraman.