You’ll hear it before you see it if you happen by the music room at Iditarod Elementary on a Monday night. Bows rosin up. Strings creak into tune. A dozen or so musicians from Mat-Su schools become an orchestra.
Kai West is the conductor. She is also the music teacher at Shaw Elementary School as well as the Artistic Director for the Valley Performing Arts Center.
She grew up around classical music. Her father played violin for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He built a family string quartet. West says everyone played whether they wanted to or not. She grabbed the cello. Her sister took the viola.
Parents asked West for a way to keep their kids playing with an orchestra. She answered the call. The Mat-Su Youth Orchestra was born. That was 20 years ago. It’s called the MSYO for short. It has grown into a nonprofit.
West says many of the young musicians were strangers at first. They came to socialize with their instruments more than with each other. Week after week, strings and personalities find their melodies in the MSYO.
Only Colony High, Colony Middle, and Birchtree Charter Schools offer orchestra. Many students get experience on stringed instruments in the music room with West on Monday nights.
She calls MSYO a teaching orchestra. She tells the young musicians, “The more you play, the better you become.” That philosophy fuels the MSYO role as a feeder into the adult Mat-Su Orchestra.
Most students are between 12 and 18 years old. West says about half the students also play in school orchestras.
Age isn’t a barrier, though. A 70-year-old woman named Jackie took up the cello after decades away. She showed up to her first rehearsal with her high school yearbook tucked under her arm. It proved she had once played. She has three years with the MSYO under her belt. She’s eyeing the bass with the adult Mat-Su Orchestra.
Fred and Carolyn Harding helped get the program off the ground. They handed West a stack of sheet music.
Harding is on violin and West’s sister is on viola. Together with a group of volunteers they play alongside the kids and coach them every Monday night.
The repertoire ranges from classical works like Bach to crowd favorites like the Harry Potter theme.
West says the kids’ energy is infectious. Some nights she can’t imagine working another minute. Walking into the music room flips a switch in her. They make her challenge them to be better.
That energy carried former MSYO violinist Anna Coke back to the orchestra for her wedding this summer. Coke’s mother told West that the orchestra had meant a lot to her daughter. She could not imagine her wedding without a piece of it in the room.
West organized a string quartet. They packed two months of rehearsals into their summer for the ceremony. West admits she had no idea how much the orchestra had meant to Coke until then.
Registration for the MSYO is open until September 28. Tuition is $100. It covers the cost of the music. There are no auditions. Students need two to three years of experience and a teacher’s recommendation.
Rehearsals are on Monday nights from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at Iditarod Elementary. The Mat-Su Youth Orchestra winter concert will be at the Valley Performing Arts Center.
More information and orchestra registration are at msyo.org.
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That’s it for today and the news on Page Two on Tuesday, September 8, 2026.
Photo courtesy of Mat Su Youth Orchestra