A number of weeks earlier than usual, the Class of 2024 of Falls Church’s Meridian High School will be graduated in a ceremony on the turf of the school’s main athletic field next Tuesday, May 28.
It was a particularly remarkable year for students in the school’s instrumental music program led by the Agnes Meyer Outstanding Teacher Award-winning and Fulbright Award recipient Mary Jo West, in her 26th year as director of the program. It was made doubly special by the visit of scores of Meridian students performing as a wind ensemble to the historic stage of one of the world’s most iconic spaces, the Carnegie Hall in New York City in early April.

In the program handed out to the Carnegie Hall audience, the 14,500 souls constituting the City of Falls Church community were highlighted for their “unwavering commitment to educational excellence” and “robust support from boosters, the administration and the community.”

West’s instrumental music achievements at Meridian High have been augmented by the work of drama instructor Shawn Northrup and choral instructor Jamie Sample.

Far from merely an “extracurricular” offering of the Falls Church school system, those programs are central to the educational goals of the system, and that has nowhere been better expressed than the new 550-page compendium entitled “Music and the Mind: Harnessing the Arts for Health and Wellness” edited by the famous soprano Renee Fleming, who is currently performing with the New York Metropolitan Opera’s production of the groundbreaking new production of “The Hours.”

This epic work consists of dozens of important essays kicked off by Fleming’s own essay, “Music and the Mind.”

In it, she cites the National Institutes of Health’s new “brain initiative” that identifies the brain as “the most complex known object in the universe,” the “biological need to express and create,” and music as “more than just a distraction that has long-lasting effects on the brain.” It is about the evolution of “the power of art to affect our minds and bodies.”

Citing Dan Levitin’s best selling book, “This Is Your Brain on Music,” it touches on “the power of music to create and sustain community, to make us feel connected to something greater than ourselves.”

In an essay in the Fleming book, “The Sound Connects Us” by Northwestern University’s Nina Kraus, the power of music is contrasted to the effect of concussive blows to the head. “Making sense of sound is one of the hardest jobs we ask our brain to do,” she writes. “The ingredients of sound – pitch, timing, timbre, loudness – occur simultaneously, and the brain has to make sense of what is said with microsecond precision. A concussive blow to the head can disrupt this delicate processing.” She presents ways in which music can contribute to a healing process for concussion victims.

An incredible program was held on May 9 in the Meridian High School auditorium that featured a wide array of performances by the incredibly high percentage of the total student body at the school who are in the instrumental music program in one form or another.

Music was performed by contemporary rock bands performing the Beatles’ “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and more, followed by jazz ensembles doing the likes of “Two Seconds to Midnight” and “Girl From Ipanema,” some IB creative music challenges, the symphonic band doing soundtrack highlights from the “Guardians of the Galaxy” films, and the wind ensemble doing George Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess,” “Adagio for Flute,” and more.

In addition to Carnegie Hall, Meridian’s instrumental students performed this year for the School of Rock in New York City, the Edward Murrow High School in Brooklyn, the high school musical, “Ruthless,” the Meridian’s Got Talent show, the Rock Jazz Fest, numerous athletic events and at performances around Falls Church, including at the Ireland’s Four Provinces restaurant, the Falls Church Craft Fair, the Farmer’s Market and the Falls Church Education Foundation gala. Jazz groups performed for the National Honor Society, the Superintendent’s Convention in Williamsburg, Solace Outpost, Jazz Rock Fest, Chantilly Jazz Festival, and at various awards ceremonies.

Additionally, students auditioned for district and state band, received private lessons, and rehearsed after school.

Among the scores of remarkable students who took advantage of the instrumental music program at Meridian, those who will be graduating next week include Alessio Azimipour, Colleen Carpenter, Megan Carpenter, Jonathan Gideon, Will Hahn, Jeremy Katen, Carson King, Ruby Jones, Campbell Michael, Carlos Ortiz, Jon Talka, David Ting, Bella Villano, Lucy Wellons and Luke Whitacre.

Earlier this month, the Outstanding Instrumental Music Senior Awards were given to Colleen Carpenter (euphonium), Megan Carpenter (clarinet), William Hahn (clarinet), Jon Talka (saxophone), and David Ting (clarinet). Senior Jeremy Katen (clarinet) received the Unsung Hero Award. Alessio Azimipour (alto saxophone) was awarded the Louis Armstrong Jazz Award. The Semper Fidelis Award from the US Marine Corp was presented to Bella Villano (flute).

In the Contemporary Rock Band category, Jonathan Gideon was recognized with the Outstanding Guitarist and Ruby Jones received the Outstanding Singer Songwriter Award. Carlos Ortiz was honored with both the John Philip Sousa Award and the FCC Band Booster Scholarship.