News

YPI Sings at Morgan Hall Vigil for Lee and Ling

June 23, 2009

For Immediate Release

The talented young musicians of Young Performers International will sing three pieces in three different languages to open the Peaceful Vigil for Euna Lee and Laura Ling, the American journalists imprisoned in Korea. The Vigil will be held on Wednesday evening, June 24, from 6-8 pm, at Morgan Hall, 491 Post Street (at Mason) in San Francisco. The young singers of YPI, who range in age from 7 to 18, will accompany themselves on guitar and percussion and will sing a South African Freedom Song, "Siyahamba", in Swahili, the poignant Ben E King anthem Stand by Me", in American Sign Language, the language of the deaf, and end with a Ghanian song of farewell, "Kwaheri" in Urdu.

Young Performers International is a non-profit children's performing arts company with branches in San Francisco, Alameda, and Marin counties. YPI provides after-school music education programs including jazz/rock band, chorus, individual instruction, and summer music camps specializing in rock, jazz, pop and world music. Fifteen percent of our students attend on scholarship, provided by YPI.

Young Performers International is sponsored by The Belvedere Community Foundation, The Steinway Musical Instrument Company, Guitar Center of San Francisco, Bananas at Large of San Rafael, A. Clinton Allen III, The Kelleher Family Foundation and E Shirts Direct.

YPI goes to Julliard

Young Performers International announces with great pride that the single piano student accepted into the world-famous Julliard School of Music's incoming freshman class was YPI's own Samora Pinderhughes. A senior at Berkeley High, Samora plays first piano with the award-winning Berkeley High Jazz Ensemble and has won many prizes since he began playing at age 2, including the prestigious Downbeat Award for "Best Original Composition/Best Song.”

Samora, along with his talented younger sister, Elena, have performed with YPI on numerous occasions, including concerts at First Unitarian Church, Yerba Buena Gardens, the historic Mills Building, and at San Francisco City Hall, where their hour-long set was so outstanding that Mayor Gavin Newsom declared the day “Samora and Elena Pinderhughes Day in San Francisco” to honor their extraordinary performance.

On their own, this scintillating duo has played everywhere from Yoshi's Jazz Club in Oakland to Carnegie Hall in New York City.

"Samora is one of the most naturally gifted musicians I've ever had the privilege of teaching," says pianist Susan Muscarella, director of The Jazz School. "He has everything he needs: great voice leading and exciting melodic lines. But most importantly, he swings hard. It would be no surprise to me to see him among the next generation of jazz masters."

Samora and Elena will be performing at the Jazz School, 2087 Addison St, Berkeley 94704 (510 845 5373) on Sunday, June 7. Tickets are $10. The concert will be a CD Release Party for their second CD “Samora and Elena Pinderhughes: Live at Yoshi’s”. Don't miss these rising young stars!

Mayor Proclaims YPI Day in San Francisco

Mayor Gavin Newsom has proclaimed November 30, 2005 "Young Performers International Day in San Francisco. " Fifteen talented YPI young musicians from all around the Bay Area gathered in the City Hall Rotunda to perform a set of holiday music that ranged from Hannukah to Christmas to the Winter Solstice -- with a few inspirational Oldies thrown in just for fun - in the city Hall Rotunda as part of the Mayor's Office of Neighborhood Services noontime concert series.

Hailed by Patti Carlisi, the concert series producer, as being "without a doubt the best chorus group to date", the Young Performers International superstars were invited on the spot to return next year, and were each given a proclamation signed by the Mayor declaring Wednesday, November 30, 2005 to be "Young Performers International Day in San Francisco."

YPI Benefit Dance Party at Slim's on Sunday, August 22

YPI's 2004 "Summer in the City" music camp culimnated in a benefit dance party at Slim's, Bozz Scaggs' all-ages nightclub in San Francisco, on Sunday, August 22, from 8-11pm. The benefit featured Bay Area music luminaries Zigaboo Modeliste, king of the funky drums, and Joey Blake, Sunshine Becker, David Worm, Bryan Dyer, and Ashling Cole, a vocal band spinoff of Bobby McFerrin's Voicestra and benefited YPI's youth outreach programs. See our press release and Summer in the City photo gallery for more information.

Curiously Strong: 100% Rock'n'Roll

Curiously Strong: Olivia Evans, Clare Wlodarczyk, Brenna Stanton and Alissa Goldberg
Photo courtesy Max Kellenberger,

Curiously Strong is YPI's rockin' grrl band, performing their unique brand of rock'n'roll at great San Francisco venues like bookseller Cover to Cover and Professor Sludge Guitar Academy's June 13 benefit concert for H.E.A.R. (Hearing Education Awareness for Rockers). See what the San Francisco Chronicle's Aidin Vaziri has to say about Curiously Strong in this Datebook article.

Allen Biggs and the Bucket Brigade

YPI percussion maestro Allen Biggs leads the Bucket Brigade teens in churning out high-energy beats in fantastic array, from Afro-Caribbean to Latin, all on found objects -- like buckets! The San Francisco Chronicle's Vicki Larson was blown away by the stunning polyrhythms of the Bucket Brigade. Inspired to learn more? Check YPI's Bucket Brigade class offering.

YPI in David Weigand's Lively Arts

David Weigand featured YPI in his March 31, 2004 Lively Arts column, highlighting YPI's April 18 spring concert, Songs from Our World, which benefited YPI's children's music outreach programs.