The Orchestra performs two concerts a year, one in the winter and one in the spring. There are ten scheduled rehearsals for each concert. Rehearsals and concerts are held at Monroe-Woodbury School District, Central Valley, NY. Membership is by audition. Rehearsals and concerts are held in local schools in Orange County, NY. In its three years of existence, OCYS has performed complete symphonies by Beethoven, Schubert, Haydn, and Dvorak, and many concert pieces by Smetana, Mozart, Dvorak, Copland, Bizet, Grieg, Mendelssohn, Strauss, Rossini and Tchaikovsky.
As a cultural exchange program, OCYS performed in Beijing, China, in April of 2010, and in Prague, Czech Republic, in February in 2011. Some members of OCYS is going to travel to Seoul, capital of South Korea, to perform several concerts with the Ein Klang Youth Orchestra in Seoul and ChangWon city in April of 2012. While in Seoul, besides performing concerts, they will stay with their host families and do a lot of sight-seeings to learn and experience the Korean cultures. The Ein Klang Youth Orchestra, which is for Korean students who are going to major in music performance in college, is planning to come to perform a joint concert with the Orange County Youth Symphony in Carnegie Hall in New York city in January 2013.
Performed its Spring Concert with Students
from the Jan Hanus School of Music, Prague, Czech Republic
As a cultural exchange program, the students from the Jan Hanus Music School received a grant from the Czech government and came to New York from June 17 to 26, and to perform with OCYS. On June 18, OCYS students and the Prague students had a rehearsal together in the morning and performed a joint concert in the afternoon in the auditorium at Chester Union Free High School. The concert selections had a big Czech and American flavor, featuring music by Czech (Smetana, and Dvorak) and American (Gershwin, and Bernstein) composers.
Ten or eleven of our OCYS families opened their homes to host the Prague students and teachers for two days. The Bezdíčková family gave a party with tons of delicious food, while the Masood family had a pool party. Everyone who came had a marvelous time!
The Prague students and their teachers stayed in New York City during the final days of their trip to explore American culture.
