Young talents are pulling out all the stops in a two-day tour de force of music and drama.

A pair of island organizations that support and showcase developing performers, the venerable Bainbridge Music and Arts and the comparatively new Bainbridge Island Youth Orchestra, will hold spring performances showcasing Bainbridge students in the arts.

In a first-ever event, BIYO joins forces with the Port Angeles Youth Orchestra in a concert on April 28, while BMA showcases this season’s scholarship recipients on April 27.

“I feel like it’s an honor to win because everyone who performed worked so hard,” said scholarship recipient Theodora Carson.

The Bainbridge High School junior was awarded the Bergliot Berg Memorial scholarship for first place in piano at BMA’s competition earlier this month.

It’s the fifth BMA scholarship she has won during her 13-year musical education under teacher Peggy Swingle.

BMA events offer Carson a chance to meet her peers, young people seriously studying an instrument. Gatherings at which the young musicians compete are a rare chance to perform for each other, she said.

“Bainbridge Music and Arts has been really important to me,” Carson said. “It’s important because it recognizes all the young up-and-coming artists of Bainbridge Island. We study with different teachers. This is the chance to come together.”

Playing at BMA events year after year has helped her to become a confident performer who anticipates rather than dreads competitions.

“I get excited, not scared,” Carson said. “It’s a good kind of nervousness.”

One of the island’s oldest arts organizations, BMA gives creative writing, drama, dance and visual arts scholarships as well. The group is seeking new members.

Monday offers strength in numbers as the Bainbridge Island Youth Orchestra and Port Angles Youth Orchestra team up for a first-time joint concert.

The two groups, comprising more than 70 performers, will play works by Tchaikovsky and Del Borgo, among other composers. Each orchestra will perform alone, ending with a joint piece.

Founded two years ago, Bainbridge’s youth string ensemble has a senior division directed by George Ramsey and a junior division led by Pat Strange.

In contrast, partner-in-time Port Angles Youth Orchestra is a full orchestra founded 20 years ago by Phil and Debbie Morgan and still led by the husband and wife team.

“We’re excited to play with a full-blown orchestra,” Ramsey said. “They have winds, percussion, timpani.”

Ramsey notes that unlike Bainbridge, the Port Angeles school district supports strings in the schools from elementary years on.

BIYO hopes to add wind instruments in upcoming seasons, and the joint concert is a great step in that direction, says Ramsey.

“We’ve had a really great season,” he said. “And now we have a music festival for the last event.”

* * * * *

Bainbridge Music and Arts holds its annual winners’ recital at 7 p.m. April 27 at Rolling Bay Presbyterian Church. First place winners in middle school piano and strings, high school piano, strings and instruments, and high school drama will perform.

For information about additional scholarship deadlines or joining Bainbridge Music and Arts, call 842-3958.

The Bainbridge Island Youth Orchestra and the Port Angeles Youth Orchestra join together to perform music from Bach to Telemann, at 7 p.m. April 28 at the Playhouse. Admission is free.

For more information about the concert or about joining BIYO, call 855-9426.