When most other students at Carroll Senior High School were heading home for the day, about two dozen young musicians filed into a rehearsal room and quickly got to work.

The sounds of quick bursts of musical notes and the flipping of sheet music filled the room as they tuned and warmed up on their trumpets, clarinets, guitars, saxophones and cello. The teenagers chatted and laughed with each other, but the room became serious as practice began.

These students make up the Carroll jazz orchestra, which is one of the best in the country. And in a few days, they’ll get another shot at taking a bow at the prestigious Essentially Ellington High School Jazz Band Festival and Competition at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City.

The jazz orchestra was invited to the festival for the eighth time, making Carroll the only high school in Texas with that many invites. Twenty schools are competing.

Every year, high schoolers from all over North America take part in the festival, which started in 1995 to help students level up their proficiency in performing and inspire them to keep improving their technical skills.

Caroll ISD has invested in performing arts. The building that the jazz orchestra practices in is the Fine Arts Complex, which was part of a $208 million bond package that voters passed in 2017. It has a performance hall that seats around 700, many rehearsal rooms, a theater production space and a large band hall.

Recently, famed jazz trumpeter and educator Pharez Whitted hosted music clinics at Carroll and McKinney North High School, which is also attending the festival along with the Jazz Houston Youth Orchestra.

Students learn hard work and dedication

Carroll’s musicians say the lessons they learn playing together will last long after they graduate.

One of those students is Sophia Kidwell, who won honorable mention for clarinet in 2025. This will be her second time taking part in the festival in New York, and she will be playing the saxophone this time.

“It was really, really cool,” she said. “I enjoyed seeing the bands from all over the country, and there were some international bands. It was amazing because we’re all from very different backgrounds, and then we’re all playing the same music.”

Sophia began on piano and singing at 4 years old and joined the Carroll jazz orchestra three years ago after encouragement from her middle school director. She doesn’t plan on pursuing a career out of it after high school, but she’ll take with her some life lessons.

“I’ve learned a lot about dedication and just working to improve things that I can control,” Sophia said. “For me, it’s more like a game versus myself, it’s not really like I’m trying to beat out other people, but instead trying to be better than I was the day before.”

For Kriti Kadiyala, a guitarist with seven years of experience, this will be her first time attending the festival. Kriti said it can be difficult playing an instrument at times, but she tries to balance her academics with jazz and dedicates at least an hour a day to practicing.

“I’m super excited to go there and show what we as a band have worked so hard on,” she said. “And even if we didn’t make it, in retrospect, I think the experience has been more worth it than whatever the outcome could be.”

Kriti plans on majoring in jazz and said her dream is to attend a prestigious cross-registration program of Barnard College of Columbia University and the Manhattan School of Music.

She said that she has been able to work on her dream with the support of her family.

“My family has been really great through this whole process,” Kriti said. “My parents, they don’t always understand the music or don’t understand what I’m playing necessarily, but they’ll always tell me you sounded great, you sounded amazing, even if I feel like it was the worst performance in my life, and that really comforts me. Because knowing that there are people who will always tell me that what I did was great even when I don’t feel like it, is comfort over sometimes what I’m insecure about, so I really appreciate them for that.”

Educators positive and upbeat attitude helps students thrive

The Carroll jazz program starts with fundamentals in middle school. The director, David Lown, is a saxophone player originally from Virginia who moved to Texas to study at the University of North Texas.

He later went to New York to become a professional musician.But Lown was bitten by the teaching bug during his time at UNT.

“I have a lot of professional experience playing with professional musicians that gives me some additional perspective that I’m able to offer to the students,” Lown said.

In order to become a finalist for the Essentially Ellington competition, which is April 30 to May 2, the students had to practice, perform and play three songs. They submitted a video of their performance to the festival to be judged.

During a practice session in March, students went over the songs they will be playing at the Lincoln Center. Lown asked them to play some parts over and over again. They happily kept at it, note by note.

The orchestra will play three pieces at the competition:

“Purple Gazelle” by Duke Ellington, a Latin jazz composition released in 1963 on the Afro Bossa album;
“The Gypsy” by Melba Liston, who according to the Indiana Public Media was the first woman to play, compose and arrange a major jazz orchestra;
“The Giddybug Gallop,” also by Duke Ellington.

Both Ellington and Liston are two of the most influential jazz performers. Ellington played for more than 50 years and was a composer, band leader and pianist. His musical performances were instrumental in breaking racial barriers.

Liston changed history by becoming the first woman soloist, trombone player, composer and arranger to play on stage alongside men.

Lown said the selection process was tough for the prestigious competition, but the students will also have time for fun.

“This is a very difficult competition to earn a spot,” he said. “This year, bands from all over the world submitted recordings and they only accepted 20 groups. And this is in a blind audition process where each band submits three pieces of music that are adjudicated usually in January.”

Lown said he and his students were on “pins and needles” after they sent in the recording.

“It’s just so tough to make it,” Lown said. “So we were just really, really thrilled. We never take it for granted getting to go. So even though it is our eighth time, it might as well be our first time, because we have such reverence for the other bands that go there and for the music that we play.

“It does require a special type of kid, and these are definitely special kids who are highly motivated, Lown said. “Most of them are never going to go on to play jazz for their career, but they will take the skills they learn here into whatever they do, and it really is making them better people.”

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