A Night Dedicated to Celebrating Global Voices
For Cathy He ’25, lead singer in THE RECK, a cross-cultural international student band, performing in the Polyglot talent show on September 22 was a no-brainer.
“We believe Polyglot provides us the stage to promote our band and share our cultural music with the community,” she explained as she and bandmates Eunice Wang ’25 (piano, ocarina), Mark He ’26 (drums), XiaoMeng Li ’25 (zither), Laura Yuan ’25 (piano, violin) and Harry Xiong ’24 (clarinet) performed the romantic pop song “Qing Hua Ci” (“Chinese Porcelain”) by well-known Taiwanese singer Jay Chou.
“Because we used both Eastern and Western instruments, we were able to create a non-traditional performance that gave the audience a novel experience,” Cathy shared.
It was the second annual Polyglot, a talent show of song, poetry and conversation with one caveat: no English allowed. It was an evening filled with 20 acts, nine languages, and an abundance of joy and community spirit.
Twenty-nine student leaders, aka “the Shareholders” of the School’s Mainstage theater program, a nod to Shakespeare's theater company, organized the event. “Our students took on roles ranging from advertising, programming the lights, running sound, house managing, hosting, and anything else you could think of to make an event run as smoothly as it did,” Anna Rosenbluth ’25, a Mainstage shareholder, explained.
Rosenbluth recalled that last year, “Mainstage put on the first Polyglot with the purpose of sharing and celebrating the many languages of Masters” and noted it was “a great opportunity for members of the Masters community to get involved. Many boarders, as well as day students, attended the event.”
This year’s highlights included Lydia Chioffi ’25 reciting a poem she wrote in German, Kseniia Lukianenko ’26 teaching her friend Diana Davleeva ’25 enough Ukrainian so they could read a poem together, and Ehimare Ehikioya ’25 explaining in Latin what goes through his brain as he solves a 3x3 Rubik's cube with one hand. Other performances featured French, Spanish, Korean, Japanese and Portuguese.
Upper school Spanish teacher Roberto Mercedes revved up the crowd with his singalong version of “Limón y Sal” by Mexican singer Julieta Venegas. “This song has been part of my classes for more than 10 years,” he said. “It is a song that all my Spanish students have learned at some point, and many really love it. It is a romantic and sweet song that never gets old.”
The students sponsored a bake sale during the event to raise funds for Music for a Purpose, an organization that assists underserved children in Africa with a passion for music.
Mercedes said this year’s experience was remarkable: “I enjoy the idea of this talent show. I can see how diverse Masters is and how strong we are as a community of people with different backgrounds who can do big things together.”
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