Sam Houston State University School of Music, SHSU dance department and the community came together Wednesday night to celebrate the Latino culture and influence.
The night of performances started with a concert by the SHSU orchestra with the Texas Guitar Quartet and faculty opera singers.
The Allegretto was a talk/answer series between the orchestra and quartet. Their fingers glided across the guitar strings to create the light, cheerful mood of a dance.
However, the stand out moment of the night was when the Huntsville Youth Orchestra joined guest pianist Mac McClure and SHSU professor of piano Sergio Ruiz to perform the famous music of the Carnival of the Animals.
The unique concert combined music, art and dance on one stage to create a total performance experience for the audience. During each of the music pieces various animals with bright, colorful costumes danced and acted out the sounds of the music. In addition, drawings and paintings of the different animals by local elementary students were displayed behind the stage to add a visual element to the concert.
The first piece of music was called the Lions Royal March, followed by Hens and Roosters, Swift Animals, Tortoises, The Elephant, Kangaroos, Aquarium, Personages with Long Ears, The Cuckoo in the Deep Woods, Aviary, Pianists, Fossils, The Swan and Finale.
Each piece offered a new mood and reaction from the audience. In Personages with Long Ears, the music was light and bouncy as the trio of animal dancers charmed the audience with their movement and body language as they crawled and posed on stage.
In Fossils, three dinosaur skeletons ran to the front of the auditorium and interacted with audience members. They kicked, jumped and shook their bodies to convey the clumsy, playful mood of the music behind them.
For members of the audience, the combination of the arts was a refreshing experience.
Sam Hendricks, a dance major said, I think that dance and music meshed well together and it was nice to see both arts in one place.
The performance also struck close to the heart for several dancers who said they were honored to dance the choreography of the late Jonathan Charles Smith, who died two weeks ago.
One of his students Traci Lee said, you can put on make up and costumes but doing this for someone was the best part.
The rest of Festival Inspiracin continues through the rest of the week, the next event will be a vocal and piano recital Thursday night at 7:30pm.