Television has its popular “American Idol,” “America’s Got Talent” and “Dancing With the Stars” — all competitions to identify great talent. Polk County now has “Polk’s got Talent,” a local talent competition and significant fundraiser for the Polk County High School choral group and competition team, “Vocal Impressions.”
The group hosting the February fundraiser, Patrons for the Performing Arts, is looking for individuals and performing groups for a multi-week competition.
“We wanted to provide a platform for our students, friends, and neighbors to showcase their talents while raising money for the very worthy cause of music education,” said Patrons for the Performing Arts president BiBi Freer. “We also wanted to plan an event that would attract the best talent in Polk County and we think we have hit the mark with this ambitious but highly entertaining idea.”
Talented individuals and groups are signing up for the competition in two categories: Junior, (up to 18 years of age) and Open (confident of your talent against any age group). Entry fee for juniors is $15, plus an additional $3 per person in the group. For example, the fee for a four-person group in juniors would be $24. Entry fee for open is $25 plus an additional $5 per person in the group. An OPEN duo would be $30.
Individuals, duos or groups compete against each other for an overall first, second and third place award in their entry group, either junior or open.
In the juniors category:
First place is $200
Second place is $100
Third place is $25.
In the open category:
First place is $500
Second place is $250
Third place is $75.
Last year, “Vocal Impressions” attended Festival Disney in Orlando and individuals raised their own funds to travel. This year, the PCHS Choral Group and parents will work as a whole to support the costs.
Vocal Impressions students and their parents plan to come up with the money by performing several fundraisers including fundraiser product sales, individual and business sponsorships, hiring Vocal Impressions members to perform “Singing Telegrams” for holiday or personal messages and the big event, the February fundraiser, “Polk’s got Talent.”
Competitors can sign up online at www.patronsforperformingarts.com or by calling the registration coordinator at 828-894-2627
All competitors must be paid in full to participate. Organizers encourage competitors to get sponsors to help cover entry fees. The deadline to sign-up is Jan. 20, 2012 and space is limited. First round of competition will be 6-9 p.m. Feb. 6-7 at the Tryon Movie Theatre. Talent advancing to the second round will compete from 7-10 p.m. Feb. 20-21. The finals will be 7-10 p.m. on Feb. 27 at the Polk County High School Performing Arts Auditorium.
Audience member’s ticket prices for the first round of competition will be $2 for students, $5 for adults.
For the second round of competition, prices are $3 for students, $5 seniors and $8 for adults. The final competition is $5 for students, $8 seniors and $10 adults.
Many schools are seeing funds cut for music classes and instruments. Individuals and communities have to create fundraisers to provide schools and students with funds to keep music a part of the curriculum. Audience tickets will be sold for each level of the contest, designed to be a fun-filled family evening of entertainment. Local celebrities like Brook Hannon, Woody Cowan, Susie Kocher and Aaron Green will serve as judges.
We hope local talent will sign up for this interesting series of programs. The goal is to have at least 30 individuals and groups perform, in each category with the semi-final week whittling that number down to 10 finalists in each category to continue on to compete in the finals. Also, we hope the community will support Polk’s got Talent by buying tickets to the performances and by purchasing sponsorships that are available for printing and advertising, cash and music-related gift prizes for the evening shows place-winners.
This can be a great competition to showcase and reward local talent while supporting students of music in our public high school.
– article submitted by Carol Lynn Jackson