The AHS Orchestra department held a bake sale fundraising event after school on Wednesday, Dec 4, giving a free performance of Christmas carols, located in the Auditorium hallway. 

The whole bake sale fundraising event spanned for two and a half hours. This year, the line up consisted of Jingle Bells, Deck The Halls, Chanukah oh Chanukah, We Wish You a Merry Christmas, just to name the major songs. 

The department has caroled every year in some shape or form, just in a slightly different setting every time. For example, two years ago, they caroled in the Barnes and Nobles at Springfield Mall. Last year, they also caroled in the morning for the last week of school. In other years, the Orchestra department also went to nursing homes to carol.

“I thought that it was pretty fun, mostly because the other people that I was playing with were also in Artiste [a level below Philharmonic, the best orchestra players],” senior Khoa Hoang said.

During the two and a half hour long performance, there were some breaks in between, but it’s safe to say that the whole event was tiring for the musicians. Only a small amount of players were present, so the burden to play it correctly was on their shoulders. If any of them played one note wrong, the crowd would notice.

“In one of the songs, I had to play the bottom line by myself, and that was really hard, but I tried my best,” senior Ilson Rivas said.

Although the event went relatively smoothly, there were some difficult moments that arose. 

“At the beginning of the bake sale, we didn’t even know where Ms. Marian was. So we really started off on the wrong note. Even worse than that, I didn’t even have my own instrument because I left it at home, so I borrowed it from one of my classmates,” senior Khoa Hoang said.

Regardless, there were also a lot of bystanders that stopped by to enjoy the melodies played, and some even helped out the cleanup process.

 “I was surprised that there were people showing up to actually watch us play, there were some people with their kids helping us clean up. At the end of the day, my shoulders were killing me,” senior Ilson Rivas said.

Sometimes, the bake sale gets as much as $200, but other times they get less. “The important thing is that we are helping the Orchestra and serving the school, that’s why we are here,” Orchestra director Larisa Marian said. 

The department is also planning to hold the Winter concert next Tuesday, on Dec 10.