- I'm Julia Spretty.

I go to Waterford-Halfmoon High School, and I play clarinet.

(piano begins playing Mozart's Clarinet Concerto) (Julia playing solo clarinet joins accompaniment) Today I played the first movement exposition of Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A Major.

I would describe this piece overall to be very expressive, and there's many places where there's lots of dynamic contrast.

There'll be sections where it's super forte, and then it goes down quiet to piano.

And I think that that really helps with the expressiveness of the piece, and it really allows me to sing through my instrument.

(Mozart's Clarinet Concerto continues) Something that's really challenging about this piece is making sure that everything is very even and subdivided exactly how it should be, especially in the slower parts of the piece, because when there's longer rhythms it's sometimes tempting to rush.

And as well as making sure that all of your fingers are going evenly with all the arpeggios, which are fast, sixteenth note passages.

So that was something that I'm actually still working on with this piece.

(Mozart's Clarinet Concerto continues) I remember back to 4th grade when we had to pick our instrument, and I remember the clarinet stuck out to me because it had such a wide range.

And I wanted something that could go really low but also had the prettier high sounding parts.

(Mozart's Clarinet Concerto continues) I try to practice every day, but some days I feel like I need a break so I might not do it literally every day, but I try to be as consistent as I can.

Typically you should start off by doing a really good warm-up exercise.

I like to work on some arpeggios and long tones and also some scale exercises, because it kind of warms up my embouchure and my air and it just makes me feel more prepared for playing.

And then usually from there, depending on how much I want to practice that, I'll work on some of my main pieces.

(Mozart's Clarinet Concerto continues) In the future, I would see myself going to a college, I'm not quite sure where I'm going yet, but I love to perform in some sort of, maybe a pit orchestra, or some sort of major orchestra for a living.

(Mozart's Clarinet Concerto continues) Yu-Heng Wang and Dr. Bebe, both from the Empire State Youth Orchestra nominated me.

I'd like to thank them for that because I wouldn't have this opportunity without them.

I'd also like to thank my parents for all of their constant support and also my clarinet teacher, Julie Taylor, because I definitely wouldn't be where I am today without her.

(Mozart's Clarinet Concerto continues)