By Judith Cookis Rubens
Mills Park Middle School vocalist Krishika Tirupathi will take the stage at New York City’s famed Carnegie Hall June 27, 2025, joining some of the world’s most promising young choral performers for a prestigious training showcase, the Middle School Honors Performance Series.
Tirupathi, 12, of Cary, was selected from thousands of worldwide applicants to join the honors junior choir after submitting an audio audition earlier this year.
Hosted by World Strides, an educational travel and study abroad company, the Middle School Honors Performance Series gives burgeoning performers real-world stage experience, training with master conductors, and helps them envision a future in the performing arts. It also hosts a similar high school program for musicians and vocalists at other famous stages in London, New York, and Sydney, Australia.
This year, the company reports more than 10,000 students applied internationally—some as far away as China, South Korea and Bermuda—and 150 middle schoolers were selected. About 80 are vocalists like Tirupathi, with the rest being young band and orchestra musicians.
Participants pay tuition and lodging (scholarships are available), to spend four nights in New York City, training with master conductors and rehearsing with fellow performers. They also get a brief NYC tour including Broadway. The conclusion is a public performance of about a half-dozen songs on stage at Carnegie Hall.
“I’m excited, thrilled and really grateful for this opportunity to perform at Carnegie Hall,” says Tirupathi, who has been singing since age 4. She started performing for family and, later, school events including her fifth-grade class at Highcroft Drive Elementary and her middle school choir. Recently, she performed the national anthem for larger crowds at a Durham Bulls baseball game and a Carolina Flyers Ultimate Frisbee game. She also performed in “Pieces of Gold,” an annual Raleigh event highlighting Wake County Public School System’s top singers, dancers and musicians.
She trains weekly at the Chapel Hill School of Music with a private voice instructor. “She came to me with a strong innate ability for singing, especially when it comes to singing with her chest voice,” says Mary Elisabeth Hirsh, a voice teacher at CHSMA, who notes her naturally good musical ear. “I can tell she has a deep connection with music.”
They work on building her confidence and how to deal with nerves before a big performance. “She doesn’t let that get to her too much,” adds Hirsh, noting the upcoming event will be a great growth experience. “It will give her a good glimpse of what a bigger and more professional choral setting will be like.”
Tirupathi, a rising seventh-grade honors student at Mills Park Middle School, enjoys dancing, musical theater, reading and rollerblading in her free time. She can’t wait to tour the Big Apple and possibly take in a Broadway Show—maybe “Aladdin” or “Wicked,” she muses. Her parents will accompany her on the trip.
She’s already started rehearsing the junior honors choir pieces at home.
“It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity,” Tirupathi says. “It’s going to be amazing.”
