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The Tacy Foundation empowers children and teens to share hope and joy with hospital patients, military veterans, senior citizens, and disadvantaged youth through performances, music recording projects, and music mentoring programs.
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Director’s Corner:
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!
Our volunteers are learning music for the holidays to share with the many seniors who gather on Saturdays and Sunday afternoons each week. All volunteers are an inspiration to the communities where they live and serve.
We are so fortunate to have many dedicated parents who accept ongoing volunteer leadership responsibilities for the many live events in our senior and hospital communities. Thank you, all! You, your children, seniors, hospital staff, and the activity directors are our heroes during this tumultuous time of job uncertainty.
I would like to thank this year’s extraordinary tech team:
Executive Intern: Shaun Wang
Tech Team members: Jessica Chen, Zach Lam, and Jaeyoon “Jake” Kim
These teen volunteers continue to coordinate (1) music video submissions to the QR code playlists for children, seniors, and hospitals; (2) video playlists for Reading Express for hospitals and underserved families; (3) management of the newly approved Life Stories project, which is now available for seniors and supports; and (4) monitoring and ongoing support for online outreach. We commend the Tech Team for their ingenuity, business acumen, and sincere dedication to serve seniors and underserved families. The Cards Team is poised and ready to send handmade cards to seniors and veterans and to persons experiencing financial and medical challenges.
We thank the communities here for their tremendous support for Piano and Guitar Pals, including Title 1 school staff for the startup of Piano (and Guitar) Pals. Our teams for this program have provided onsite setup with keyboards and equipment for each location. The elementary schools are Brown Station, Fox Chapel, and Gaithersburg ES. Other locations are the Housing Opportunities Commission Stewartown community in Gaithersburg and Tanglewood Apartments in Silver Spring. HOC leadership continue to request and support Tacy Foundation programs for youth and seniors.
Please read the stories below and be assured that your interest and support continue to inspire us through the enormous changes and challenges here in the nation’s capital and surrounding areas.
Follow the links on the newsletter portal to music playlists and to children’s stories for Reading Express.
The Life Stories project has ignited a deep interest among seniors. Thank you, Samuel Wang and Anirudh Sridhar, alumni proofreaders Holly Lam, Anika Seth, Shairee Arora, Daniel Zhu, and newsletter Chief Editor Michael Favin.
We send our hope for joy and healing to all we meet and touch through music and art.
Charlotte Tacy Holliday, Founder & Executive Director
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Looking Back on a Year of Growth
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It was March 23rd. My mind was racing to answer all my questions, fruits of my nervousness. What if I messed up the introduction speech? What if I accidentally let go of the microphone, and it clattered onto the ground, with wire mesh everywhere and the electronics barely dangling off the plastic frame, accusingly, reminding me of the embarrassment I should be feeling?
Regardless of the feelings and emotions or any questions that I might have had at the moment, the program had to go on. So, being the brave, courageous soul I am… I let my wonderful co-chief intern Caroline Su give the speech instead, and she was brilliant.
At the end of our recital, my head packed with appreciation for music, I decided to give the closing speech, congratulating the many performers that day who had played brilliantly to spread hope and joy to our elderly community.
Time flies. On August 24th, I was standing in the same lobby, an area that had become quite familiar to me after the performances over the past five months. All the performers were waiting in the bar next to the lobby. Caroline and I, the two co-chief interns, were discussing that day’s program. After a brief introduction, the first performer walked onto the stage and presented a delightful contemporary piece. Following the strong opening, we played Berkovich’s Variations on a Theme by Paganini, Brahm’s Hungarian Dance, and a Beethoven sonata. We also performed a waltz and nocturne, both in C-sharp minor by Chopin, Liszt’s Spanish Rhapsody, and Liebermann’s Gargoyles, all of which were played with technical dexterity and musical euphony, creating a wonderful experience for the audience.
What have I learned from being a chief intern over the past six months? The answer is… I learned that there is so much more to learn, especially from our elderly community.
Never could I have ever imagined just how many beautiful stories our elders can tell us. I was so honored during our last recital in September, to be able to listen to only a fraction of the wealth of memories they had. It’s a fantastic feeling to know that every one of our recitals have performers telling a story through music and the audience telling another.
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My son Michael has been performing with the Tacy Foundation since 2021, and we’re very grateful for the wonderful opportunities it has given him to share his music. The Tacy Foundation is an amazing organization that inspires young musicians while bringing joy and hope to the community.
You are cordially invited to attend Michael’s upcoming performance, which is described below.
-Armine Galstyan
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A Passion Project
Dennis S. Tsitsiwu
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Last month, I released a 15-minute animated short called “The Adventures of Montgomery the Flamingo at the Zoo” for the Tacy Foundation’s Reading Express playlist on YouTube. The story follows a young flamingo residing at the Applegate Zoo, the largest zoo hidden in the mountains. The flamingo yearns for freedom from his imprisonment and decides one day to break free alongside every other animal.
This animation was a long-standing passion project of mine. Initially, it was based on a short story I wrote in high school, but by the time I finished, I knew that the best way to experience the story was in animation. By that time, I had been introduced to Adobe Animate, as that software was available on the school’s computers. However, a challenge arose: the grand scale of this project meant that I would be throwing myself into the deep end instead of familiarizing myself with the software. So, I decided to hold off on that project and dedicate several months to creating two simpler stories with the same main character, Montgomery. That took two months to complete. Sadly, I eventually became too busy to work on more projects, so I put my passion project on hold until this year.
Upon graduation from Howard University in the spring, I noticed that my school account had access to Adobe Creative Cloud. As I was bored at home, I knew it was the perfect time to put my passion project in the spotlight. Because I was rusty with the software again, I decided to create several more animations before producing the big one. Over the course of three months, I mastered shadowing, lighting, special effects, and storytelling. I improved on character models, backgrounds became more detailed, and I implemented soundtracks to further advance the plot. Moreover, as I was a continuing member of the Tacy Foundation, I wanted these ambitious projects to be seen on the Reading Express as a form of storytelling, so that’s what I did.
In September, I began work on the passion project. The time between my first animations and this one saw drastic changes. Montgomery the Flamingo became Vermillion the Phoenix, but I wanted to stay true to my source material. Therefore, I decided to tell the story as a play. Vermillion ended up playing the role of Montgomery. After two weeks, the passion project was finally finished and posted to the Reading Express playlist. As of right now, I consider it my magnum opus.
Watch the animated story here.
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Arthur Hunt, currently living at Brookdale Senior Living, was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1940. However, he lived there only until the age of three. Because of his mother’s fear that the Germans would bomb New York, the family then moved to Long Island, even though, as he noted, the new location ironically placed him closer to the Germans.
Whilst in elementary school, he had trouble getting to the same level as his classmates. He described his academic life from fifth to tenth grade as playing a game of catch-up. However, after tenth grade, he had a “eureka” moment when he achieved the honor roll. He continued to be an honor roll student from that point on, and he was class president in his sophomore and junior years of high school. He remembers that the Korean War created a lot of anxiety. He also remembers when Kennedy was elected as President and later assassinated.
Throughout his life he had two best friends who both sadly have passed. He met one for the first time at his first job working for UPS.
Afterwards, he went to college to be a church minister but decided to drop out and join the army once he realized that being a minister wasn’t the best thing for him. Although he wasn’t supposed to be drafted, under his parents’ noses he decided to ask to have his position in the draft pushed up. He was drafted into the army but was a “conscious objector” because of his faith. He would not take up arms, and hence he was sent to join the medical corps.
After leaving the military, he went to college to become a registered nurse (RN) on the GI Bill, which paid for veterans’ higher education. He joked that he never had anyone die while he numbed them for an operation when he was a nurse. When asked how he was able to become what he was, he remarked, “no matter what, we all have the same qualifications…. We all start the same way. You can be anything you will yourself to be, but you need to individualize yourself to do it. No matter how you’re born, it’s up to you to make it.”
Growing up, he went through the motions and phases of music for the times. Mr. Hunt didn’t particularly like hip-hop, and he also noted an original distaste for the Beatles, thinking that they were silly. However, in the end, like most people, he came to enjoy their music.
When asked what was most important to him, Mr. Hunt answered that family was the most important thing in the world. His family consisted of his brother, who unfortunately passed, and two sisters. Mr. Hunt lived with his wife and has two daughters, Beverly and Pam. Sadly, however, Pam, who had four children, died due to pneumonia at 32 years of age. When additionally questioned, he noted the importance of to “try[ing] to understand them [your children] and your siblings. You grow up with them, but in the end, really, you don’t have a lot of time with them and your parents.” He mentions Harry Chapin’s 1974 song “Cat’s in the Cradle” that details a story of a father and son. The father didn’t have time for the son in childhood, and when the son reached adulthood, he ironically didn’t have time for his father. He believes everyone can encounter situations like that in their lives.
Looking back on his life, Mr. Hunt reflects that he’s most proud that through the help of God, he got through his schooling and was led along the right pathways. He remarked that “the way [life] has turned out now, I made life more difficult for myself. With God, all things have been possible, but I’ve never made the effort to study properly. Yet, when things turned out well for me, I believe I've had God’s intervention to set me on the right track.”
Mr. Hunt doesn’t wish to redo anything, as the way he sees it, he wouldn’t change a thing. He views the times from when he was young and today's world as similar, just a bit more advanced. Looking for parallels between when he was growing up and today's world, he believes that young people should get to know God. His words of choice were “no deviation from strict integrity will meet God’s approval.” This quote is also the advice he has for those growing up now. Principle is very important in the setting of the 21st century, and all kids should follow this approach to life.
Thanks to volunteer editor Shairee Arora who assisted with this story.
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For information on Life Stories, visit the Tacy Foundation website (Programs/Life Stories). Stories will be shared in the newsletter as well as on the website.
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Educational mission: Foster youth development through music, story and mentoring
Philanthropic mission: Empower youth to discover and use their gifts in service to others
Social mission: Build community partnerships and create intergenerational connections
Whom We Serve
Seniors
Children
Teens
Service members
Veterans
Injured/sick
Economically disadvantaged
Individuals who want to serve
How We Serve (Programs)
Live music concerts
Reading Express®
Piano Pals®
Guitar Pals®
Composers’ Circle
Music USBs
Musical equipment
COVID projects through video, email, cards, puzzles for outreach to the community
Charlotte Holliday, Founder and Executive Director
Michael Tacy and Zoe Bell, Graphic Editors
Michael Favin, Chief Editor
Donations are appreciated. All adult and teen staff are volunteers. No salaries or benefits. Every dollar you donate goes to supplies for all projects offered to the community.
Thank you!
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