On May 3, the Practice Pals organization hosted a concert in Lexington High School’s Black Box Theater. Practice Pals is a non-profit that aims to provide free music education to students, founded in 2024 by LHS junior Anika Chakrabarti. 

Chakrabarti has been playing violin for 12 years. During these years, she has had many different teachers, inspiring her to spread this knowledge of music and help younger students experience different styles of teaching. 

Chakrabarti noticed that the price for private lessons for musical instruments was steadily increasing. She personally knew many family members who couldn’t take private lessons because of pricing and financial commitment. 

“I thought it would be a good time to start something where I could combine financial support with this new type of mentorship that could really help people,” Chakrabarti said. 

This idea led her to start Practice Pals in order to give kids in Lexington the opportunity to learn to play musical instruments for free, mentored by students at LHS.

“We’re just hoping that through these mentor lessons, where they can teach or they can learn from someone who is closer in age to them and they can talk to and relate to, they can really find their joy and passion in their playing,” Chakrabarti said. 

Miranda Zhou, a junior at LHS, is Practice Pals’ vice president and publicist. Zhou works to raise the organization’s publicity through social media and posters, but she also plays several other roles.

“I am a vice president of Practice Pals. I’ve been a mentor, I teach cello, and I’ve supervised some concerts,” Zhou said.

 Regarding the preparation for the concert, the program faced challenges with location and communication. Zhou noted that finding a suitable location was an important aspect of the performance, and there was a lot of discussion around that. 

“We had to communicate with [parents and students] beforehand and make sure everyone came on time, and we needed to know everyone’s pieces beforehand to make a program,” Anika Chakrabarti, the president of Practice Pals, said.

Ultimately, the Practice Pals team was able to overcome its planning challenges and hold its most successful concert to date.

“This was our most successful concert this year. We basically held it as this end-of-the-year concert to showcase all of the work that our students and mentors have put in this year,” Chakrabarti said.

Zhou had similar views, reflecting on the success of the concert.

“The concert went pretty well, especially compared to our first concert in the winter. I saw significantly more attendees,” Zhou said. “I also noticed that throughout the concert, even though the students made some mistakes, we were still there to encourage them and support them, and I think that’s really precious.”

This school year, Practice Pals has held two concerts: one in December and most recently, one in May. Both featured performances by Practice Pals’ students and mentors.

Additionally, Practice Pals used the revenue earned from concert tickets to raise money for their partner charity, the Save the Music Foundation, based in New York. Save the Music aims to spread free music education and fund music programs in schools—goals that align with those of Practice Pals.