The Kingwood Park High School Orchestra has been selected to perform at the 2026 White House Holiday Open House in Washington, D.C.
Chosen from more than 1,000 applicants from across the country, the student musicians will perform holiday and Christmas music at the White House on Tuesday, Dec. 1, from 5:40 to 8 p.m.
Kingwood Park Orchestra Director Evan Farmer learned about the opportunity in late July, when FOX 26 LiveNow aired a story announcing that the White House was accepting applications for volunteer decorators and performers for the Christmas season.
Farmer immediately thought of the orchestra’s Christmas Club.
“A few years ago, we created a program called the Christmas Club,” Farmer said. “It’s a way for our students to come together and play, regardless of their experience level.”
The KPark Christmas Club performs at Humble ISD elementary schools, local hospitals and nursing homes. Its most meaningful performance each year, however, is a front-yard concert for a Kingwood Park faculty member experiencing a challenge, such as a death in the family or a health issue.
“We work with our counselors and front office staff to identify a faculty member who may have had a difficult year,” Farmer said. “We load our students onto a bus and perform a front-yard concert for that faculty member and the surrounding community. It is our way of supporting them during what may be the hardest time of the year.”
Once classes began in August, Farmer and the Christmas Club musicians had approximately two weeks to assemble their application and produce a performance video. Kingwood Park journalism students Shawn Chaney and Lily Story produced the video.
Participation in the orchestra gives students more than an opportunity to perform music. Christmas Club members describe the orchestra as a supportive, family-like environment that offers meaningful opportunities for leadership and service.
“Christmas Club is very different from just about any other kind of performance,” Senior Brock Hirschfied said. “You’re playing for people in need during the holidays. The atmosphere is so different, and you really just connect with the audience.”
Sophomore Eden Rotberg said the club has helped her build relationships with students throughout the orchestra.
“Christmas Club has helped me see people at different experience levels, and it has helped me make more friendships across the orchestra,” Rotberg said.
That sense of belonging is central to the orchestra’s identity.
“We have a saying around here: ‘We Are KPark,' Farmer said. “It’s a reminder that you’re never alone and that you are part of something special.”
The upcoming trip also holds personal significance for Farmer, who had the opportunity to visit Washington, D.C. when he was a junior in high school.
“I would love to share that same experience with my students now,” Farmer said.
Farmer is in his 18th year of teaching, and taught at Riverwood Middle School and Summer Creek High School before Kingwood Park High School.
The prestigious invitation offers the student musicians an extraordinary opportunity to represent Humble ISD and the KPark community on a national stage while sharing the Christmas Club’s spirit of music, service and connection.
Photo: Cover photo of the Kingwood Park High School Orchestra Video Application for the White House Holiday Open House Performance.