- [David] A bus pulls up, kids come streaming out, and they're ready to perform.

They're ready to showcase what they've done all year.

(instruments tuning) (indistinct chatter) - Eyes up.

- They're excited, oftentimes looking up, and, "Wow, I've never been here.

This is downtown."

You've got the smell of the food truck vendors, lunchtime's there, kids excitedly setting up, parents coming and sitting down.

When I say a celebration, it's a celebration, and that's what it should be.

(bright orchestral music) So Spring Celebration is the Gerald M Brookhart Arts and Education Spring Celebration.

As we enter our 41st year, this is a celebration of visual, performing, band, orchestra, you name it.

A celebration of arts and education across the seven counties, central Illinois area.

(audience applauds) We are excited to showcase in a non-competitive environment what art educators, students, and really the school community has done in this past year.

- We come down and we play songs for free, for anybody who wants to come and listen.

And it's a good way for everybody to show off their talents and how they can perform.

- The event is the Gerald M. Brookhart Spring Celebration.

He was a regional superintendent of schools for many years and decided that he wanted to try this to see how the schools would respond to it and the kids would respond.

Well, obviously they responded.

We are 41 years now doing this.

(soft bright music) - As regional superintendent, my office was on the fourth floor of the courthouse, and I could look out every day in the beautiful area down there.

I thought, "Man, we can use that as a great, great platform to display community education."

I said, "You know, we have these little kids and we wondered if we could come down and have them display some of their artwork."

We could put that artwork all around the plaza.

We wanna promote within the community the good things kids are doing that nobody ever hears about.

Because in Illinois, 25% of the people have kids in school.

So they see the things hung up on the refrigerator all the time, but the other 75%, really little or nothing in terms of school and what's going on in the program.

So we said, "Well, this will be a great opportunity to show some of the good things these kids are doing.

So let's do it."

- It's a really, really nice opportunity for everybody to be able to show off what they can do and what they have been able to do.

(upbeat band music) (audience cheers) - I didn't intend it to be an ongoing thing, but you could see that it had value and so why not?

- Thank you so much for coming.

My name is Dave Poehls with the Regional Office of Education and we are so happy to host the 41st year of the Gerald M. Brookhart Arts and Education Spring Celebration.

We really want the community as a whole to join us, to celebrate their students and perhaps even students they don't know too.

Follow us on Facebook at the Gerald M. Brookhart Arts and Education Celebration.

- The celebration is a day that we hope the kids always remember this.

If your kids are happy, it's a happy community.

And they love what they do when they come down here.

They feel uplifted because it's about that, because they are our citizens that are coming up.

- It really warms my heart to see that because my own kids came down and they were part of it.

And I really enjoy the grandmas and grandpas that come down.

Rather than just have an empty space, we had a vibrant space that reached out into the community, and the community in turn reached out to them.

- But they will always remember, "I came downtown, I did that."

I cannot tell you how many people each day say to me, "I remember doing this when I was here at school."

So I just want them to leave with a wonderful feeling.

I want them to know their worth and to know they can do something, maybe that's out of their normal box of stuff that they do.

- It gives everybody an opportunity to show what they can do and provide music to the world and make everyone happy when they're here around it.

- You know, art, I think, is the best medicine and hope for people.

Art and music.

It lifts up everybody's soul.

Who doesn't like to sit and listen to good music?

Every child that steps off that bus enjoys themself, knows their worth, and knows the worth of arts.

- And it doesn't take a whole lot of imagination.

Just look around your environment and say, "What can I utilize here to make it a better world," I suppose.

(upbeat drumming music) (audience cheers)