Hartt Festival Pairs High School Choral Groups with Music Professionals

On Thursday, October 5, high school choral groups will have the opportunity to receive feedback on their performance pieces from two top music professionals during The Hartt Choral Festival 2023 at The Hartt School’s Alfred C. Fuller Music Center. Ethan Nash, a regional choral director, and Carolina Flores, and interim director of choral activities at Hartt, will participate in morning and afternoon sessions at this exclusive clinic.

Nash, who has a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in choral conducting from The Hartt School, has taught, conducted performance groups, and directed stage musicals for several years at schools in New York and Connecticut.

Flores, who also earned a DMA in choral conducting from Hartt, is a prize-winning pianist who previously taught at the University of Rhode Island and New Haven’s Notre Dame High School, and has served as artistic chorale director of the Manchester Symphony Orchestra and assistant director and accompanist for the New Haven Chorale. She has also performed at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall and at Rockefeller Center.

At the Hartt Choral Festival, in addition to getting professional feedback, high school choral groups will have a chance to perform for each other in a relaxing, non-competitive atmosphere, which Flores calls “pure joy.” For more details, including information on accompanists, and to register, please visit the Choral Festival web page.

“When I was a student, my school used to host a festival like this,” Flores says. “It was fun. I wanted make something similar available to any high school choral group, at no cost. So that’s exactly what we have done.”

The Hartt School hopes that the Choral Festival will become an annual event.