The Valentine's Sweetheart Gala usually sells out in advance. The Park City High School and Treasure Mountain Junior High School music program benefit from the proceeds raised.
Those who attend will be entertained by the Varsity Jazz ensemble.
The Sweetheart Gala is Friday, January 31st. Tickets are $60.00 for standard seats and more if you want a table close to the dance band. Band Director Brett Hughes says the ticket includes a three-course catered dinner, dancing, a silent auction.
“The highlight of the evening obviously is three hours of live dancing to the music of the Varsity Jazz Ensemble from Park City High School and a lot of people don't understand that the Varsity Jazz Ensemble is an incredibly high caliber group.”
They hope to make $20 to $25,000 for the Sweetheart Gala this year. The money they raise will be used to help keep the Marching Band in competitions this coming fall season. Hughes says they get a lot of support from Park City School District and the Park City Education Foundation.
“As in most things that Park City education parents and students, [They] are really looking for a world class caliber education. And so, as much as the school district is able to support our curricular programs and our staffing and things like that, for us to be able to offer things like marching band and steel drum band, and some of those things that happen outside of the school day, and some of those things that really keep students engaged and interested in what we're doing, we need to fundraise to be able to offset the costs of staffing and instruments and things for those events.”
The Park City music program begins at Ecker Hill Middle School and impacts about 450 kids between the middle school, junior high and high school.
“The band, it’s comprised of about 240 students grades eight through 12 and then there's about another 200 involved at Ecker Hill and so the PC bands overseas all of the band program 6 through 12.”
Music students perform all over the city and the state in a variety of concerts, competitions and gigs around town. The link pcbands.net has a complete calendar of all performances. The band students play a role the fundraiser. While the Jazz Band is performing, the rest of the band asks businesses to contribute to the auction, and they work the tables at the event itself.
If interested in having dance lessons before the gala, a high school teacher has organized swing and fox trot lessons for a small cost.
You can find a link https://www.pcbands.net/ for dance lessons or purchase tickets to the January 31st Sweetheart Gala at St. Mary’s Catholic Church, on KPCW.org.
