This program is brought to you in part by the Erika Lewis Endowment Fund.

♪♪♪ Hi, everyone, I'm Mauricio Marin.

-And I'm Melinda Malone.

We're here at Kitty Ward Elementary School to bring you a very special edition of Student Spotlight.

-During the next half hour, you'll learn more about some of the exceptional music programs in the Clark County School District, including here at Kitty Ward.

-And then you'll have a front-row seat to watch those students perform just for you.

We'll take you to the theater at Foothill High School in Henderson to enjoy one of the best concert bands in the valley.

-And then to the field at Gibson Leadership Academy to feel the beat of this middle school drumline.

-But first we'll start here at Kitty Ward Elementary School where students are "jam-packed" with talent.

"Hello little children..." ♪♪♪ (Braylon Booker) So we're in music, and we learn how to read music and play recorder and also play drums.

(Yasmin Kerr) My favorite thing about music is all of it really, because music is just like the best thing.

Ever since I was born basically I've loved music, like I loved Baby Shark for as long as I can remember.

(Tim Wiegand) Our performance group is called Jam Pack, and the reason for that is we try to take all the elements that we do in music class and then ramp it up.

So Jam Pack plays recorder, they sing, they dance, they play drums, they play the percussion instruments.

Anything we would do in music class, we kind of just take it to the next level with my performance groups.

(Sonora Hinton) I've learned multiple things, like to read music.

I've learned that just learning music can help me in middle school, and also I've learned to be very patient because when we first started Jam Pack, it was like we kept messing up and it was hard, and now as we go home and practice, we just kept getting better and it's because of the effort and practice we put into it.

♪♪♪ One of the things that I learned is discipline, because we have to wake up early in the morning to get here and do our practices, and that can help in your everyday life whether you're playing sports or work.

You have the discipline to get up when you really don't want to do it.

-I think music uses both sides of the brain.

It's one of those few subjects that really engages the brain in a very special way.

So not only are you reading with your eyes, the rhythm, the melody, you know, pitch and whatnot, you're also using your motor skills so you're using your hands and your legs and your arms and your body as you play, and you're breathing.

So it's a very intricate skill that helps kids develop as they grow.

All right.

Let's get a little guitar.

Are you ready?

-Music is like my happy place.

Every time I listen and do music, I always feel joy, relaxed, and it really doesn't depend on the song for me.

Like even if it's scary, I still like it.

-Jam Pack is awesome, and it's the best thing ever.

I love it.

It's so cool.

-Give yourselves a hand!

That was awesome, kiddos!

I'm so proud of you.

You did great!

-Our first song is "We Are the Ones" written by our teacher, Mr. Wiegand.

♪♪♪ ♪ We are the ones ♪ ♪ making a difference today.

♪ ♪ The world needs our help ♪ ♪ to make it a better place, ♪ ♪ and though we are young ♪ ♪ and our future seems miles away, ♪ ♪ the world needs our help ♪ ♪ to make it a better place right now.

♪ ♪ A better place right now, yeah, ♪ ♪ A better place right now, ♪ ♪ A better place right now, yeah.

♪ ♪ Locks of Love, recycling, ♪ ♪ planting trees, giving things, ♪ ♪ Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, ♪ ♪ the future is not in doubt.

♪ ♪ Cleaning up our town, ♪ ♪ never giving put-downs, ♪ ♪ we can do anything ♪ ♪ if we follow our dreams.

♪ ♪ Locks of Love, recycling, ♪ ♪ planting trees, giving things, ♪ ♪ Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, ♪ ♪ the future is not in doubt.

♪ ♪ Cleaning up our town, ♪ ♪ never giving put-downs, ♪ ♪ we can do anything ♪ ♪ if we follow our dreams.

♪ ♪ We are the ones ♪ ♪ making a difference today.

♪ ♪ The world needs our help ♪ ♪ to make it a better place, ♪ ♪ and though we are young ♪ ♪ and our future seems miles away, ♪ ♪ The world needs our help ♪ ♪ to make it a better place right now.

♪ Next we will be playing "Peas Porridge Hot," drum parts written by Mr. Wiegand.

♪♪♪ Our last song is called "Splash of Blue" and it's made by Mr. Wiegand, and it's glow in the dark!

♪♪♪ That was incredible!

Thank you, Kitty Ward Elementary School.

From our youngest performers to our most experienced, the Foothill High School Band has a national reputation.

You may have seen the marching band a few years ago in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade or maybe the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena.

Foothill's jazz ensemble, wind symphony and other groups have won multiple competitions, and students have performed up and down the Las Vegas Strip.

We sat down during a recent jazz rehearsal to meet some of these young musicians.

Then keep watching for a jaw-dropping performance by Foothill's concert band.

♪♪♪ (Andrew Fulmer) So I play three instruments: I play the oboe, the piano, and I'm also learning saxophone.

My favorite is jazz just because I do more stuff in it as a piano player.

(Connor Bertolani) I play the trombone; it's just fun.

I feel like it's one of the more fun instruments just because you can do something called a "gliss" where you play an instrument, you play one note, and you slide it down.

It just makes this great sound where it's like a "weeerro" sound, which is pretty fun.

(Samantha Frost) I play the clarinet in the marching band and our concert wind symphony.

And then in jazz band, I play the piano.

We do improvisation, and we also even have musical theater plays, and I had the opportunity to play piano for that and got to do a whole Broadway score on that as well.

(Kaden Bowers) I play the tenor saxophone, so I play the second biggest saxophone.

-Our band program is very-- we're very advanced, so we get music that is challenging but still fun.

(Travis Pardee) Well, it's important to teach all different styles of music or as many as we can, and some kids gravitate towards other aspects of the program.

So some kids really like marching band, and some kids just really like jazz band.

-Well, I think I definitely learn a lot about working with other people.

In music you have to pay attention to what other people are doing and make your sounds complement each other, so it's a big teamwork process.

But you also learn how to express yourself through your emotions and your music.

-It teaches me time management.

Also it teaches us leadership because I was a student leader for two years, so I helped teach other students, teach them how to march, teach them how to play loud, tell them where their instrument should go in the press box, stuff like that.

-Music has been probably the biggest role in my life from getting me through the day, like I'm always listening to music, different-- listening to different types of music, and it's made such a big impact on my life.

♪♪♪ I really enjoy it.

Like whenever we do really good on a song or just come back from a competition and we feel like we did well, everybody's just happy and grateful that they were able to do so well.

-They put in a lot of work.

Kids are coming to school with purpose and reason.

-It's definitely something that I'm very proud to represent.

We have really good sound, and I think something really special about our band is that we put a lot of emotion and feeling and movement into our music that a lot of bands lack, so it's really special.

It's cool to be a part of it.

♪♪♪ -Our first selection is "Fanfare for Athena" by Tyler S. Grant.

♪♪♪ Our next piece is "The Nativity Paintings" from Scenes from the Louvre by Norman Dello Joio.

♪♪♪ Our third selection is "The Portals" from Scenes from the Louvre by Norman Dello Joio.

♪♪♪ Thank you, Foothill High School, for that wonderful performance.

Our last stop is at Gibson Leadership Academy, a middle school known for its drumline.

♪♪♪ (Andrew Cereghino) So a drumline is just a bunch of drums that when they're alone sound a little bit, you know, boring or unexciting, and they become like-- together they become this complex rhythm and this nice beat that is really nice to hear.

(James Violegas) I play the bass drum.

It's honestly my favorite drum.

It has a lot of beat to it, I guess.

I like the beat.

(Adriana Quiterio) I play the snare drum.

It's probably the one that you see the most.

It's the one that's always in the front.

It's usually what grabs people's attention to say hey, this looks interesting.

♪♪♪ (Earl Henry) You're on the clip.

I was a substitute, and they wanted me to have some kind of class because they'd seen I was doing pretty good with the students or whatever.

So they asked me, like what do you do?

And honestly, I don't know why it popped in my head, I said I was in a drumline.

You were in a drumline?

And from there they wanted to create an actual class to make this work.

(Marcos Gomez) I play the snare.

It's like everything else, with practice you can learn it.

Like with enough practice, you memorize it while playing it over and over again.

-Probably the biggest thing I've learned so far is learning how to read music.

I've always been fascinated with music, but I never really knew that I was capable of doing well in music.

-It feels really united, like it kind of brings everybody together because we're all on the same tempo, we're all playing the same thing, and it feels really together and it brings us all together and it just feels, you know, incredible.

-I don't know how, but this drumline actually keeps them motivated.

I had a lot of students that tell me they only come into the class or come into school to be in drumline.

So whatever it is, it's something that motivates them to keep going and actually become a better student.

♪♪♪ In drumline we play cadences, and the first cadence we're performing is called "Genesis."

♪♪♪ The next cadence we will perform is "V2 Rocket."

♪♪♪ For our next cadence, we are going to be playing "New Cadence."

♪♪♪ Amazing!

Thank you to the students and staff at Gibson Leadership Academy for inviting us to your school.

We hope you enjoyed this special spring student performance edition of Student Spotlight.

We were so impressed and continue to be impressed by the talent of our student musicians.

-A reminder that you can watch this program and other episodes of Student Spotlight on the Vegas PBS website, vegaspbs.org.

-We'll see you next month as we wrap up the school year.

As always, thank you for watching.

♪♪♪