Music Professor Mike Pecherek took his 2016-17 music theory class, along with four other committed students, on a day trip to Chicago to visit the Art Institute and enjoy a concert by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on April 7.

The annual trip is made possible thanks to a $10,000 donation from Nancy Maze, a long-time supporter of the arts in the Illinois Valley.

The concert made headlines as the performance was the American premiere of Shostakovich’s “Funeral Song,” a long-lost piece of music rediscovered in 2015.

“Through Nancy’s generosity, I am able to expose my students to one of the great art museums – the Art Institute of Chicago, and then walk across the street to one of the great orchestras in the world – the Chicago Symphony Orchestra – all in a single day,” said Pecherek. “It is an experience which cannot be obtained except through the actual experience.”