Sing a new song — New Flathead Valley Youth Choir is the first initiative of Bear Grass Performing Arts

A reprise of a Kalispell-based youth choir will bring children around the valley together again to sing. 

Flathead High School choir teacher Jennifer Stephens and former Glacier High School choir teacher Nathan Connell have joined forces to launch the Flathead Valley Youth Choir for third through sixth graders.  

The Flathead Valley Youth Chorus is the first initiative of Bear Grass Performing Arts, a new organization created by Connell, who serves as executive director, and Stephens, who is the artistic director.  

The two hope the choir will add to the valley’s rich repertoire of performing arts programs for youth and increase children’s access to extracurricular singing opportunities and music education. 

“We would love to be serving 60 kids by the first rehearsal,” Stephens said, who will conduct the youth chorus. 

The first rehearsal will be held Sept. 12. To participate, students should complete an online form and submit a video singing, “Happy Birthday,” at www.fvyc.org. Stephens said the audition is a means for her to assess where level the child is at. The program is open to youths in public, private or homeschools. 

The choir will meet once a week from 4:15 to 5:15 p.m. on Thursdays in the choir room at FHS, 644 Fourth Ave. W. Tuition is $225 a semester and scholarships are available. 

The Flathead Valley Youth Chorus is also partnering with Kalispell Public Schools’ work-based learning program by incorporating high school student interns to assist in the weekly rehearsals. 

“This is a way is a way for them to get experience seeing if music education is something they want to do, getting credit for that, and a way for us to be part of the community and linking up with the public schools in a more formal way,” Stephens said. 

She said there is also an opportunity for high school interns interested in learning about the administrative side of operating a nonprofit to work with Connell, who is learning himself as Bear Grass is the first nonprofit he’s organized. 

“He’s also serving the organization as the on-staff accompanist this year, so he does still get to have his head in the music,” Stephens said. 

STEPHENS HAS waited quite a while for the right timing to launch a youth choir. She said a Kalispell-based children’s choir used to be available to children more than a decade ago through the Glacier Symphony and Chorale under the leadership of longtime conductor Shauneen Garner. 

“I’ve wanted to start a children's chorus ever since I moved to the valley … 12 years ago,” Stephens said. “But I have enough experience in the game to know that I did not have all the bandwidth to do all of the [administrative] support that you need if you’re going to start a community ensemble.” 

The timing was finally right this year with Connell taking on the administrative side of starting a nonprofit. 

“We have worked together since 2019 and greatly enjoyed working together the whole time, and so, as I was transitioning out from Glacier I reached out to Jennifer and was like, hey, you have seen the need and have talked about starting a youth chorus forever, and I now have the capacity to help bring that vision to life,” Connell said. 

A board was assembled with community members with connections or backgrounds in music and education. 

“People that are passionate about educational opportunities for youth and music for youth. That's who's on the board,” Stephens said. 

One of those members is Kalispell Education Foundation Director Dorothy Drury who sang in the Glacier Chorale’s children’s choir under Garner in the ’90s.  

“Having that opportunity here growing up was such a special and unique experience and I am so excited that Nathan and Jennifer have taken the effort on to make that experience available again to our community,” she said. 

Drury continued her love of singing in a choir as an adult and is a member of the Glacier Chorale. 

“Music is so important in my life,” she said. “Once a week we get to come together as a group of people with different life experiences and different backgrounds to create beautiful music. But that love of music and feeling of community was sparked when I was younger in the children's choir,” she said. 

Stephens and Connell echoed a similar sentiment on the social and emotional pluses, and cognitive, of singing in an ensemble. 

“The act of singing in a group with other people is tremendously powerful. It's very instinctive, and it's joyful. It's so much fun,” Stephens said. “So for kids, not only do you have all that wonderful cognitive development that's happening in a musical setting, where you're learning this very complex skill right of understanding pitch and rhythm and harmony and learning to read a notational system, all of which are going to be skills that we develop in this ensemble, but they're also getting to experience the joyful, tingly feeling that is a whole group of human beings singing together, getting that beautiful sound together. 

“It's electrifying, it's inspiring. It just feels good to be a part of.” 

Bear Grass Performing Arts has applied for 501(c)(3) and Connell expects the nonprofit status will be granted soon. The organization is currently looking to raise $15,000. 

For more information, or to donate, visit fvyc.org or email info@fvyc.org.

Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.