Angelique Montes, a 17-year-old cellist, was chosen from over 1,000 musicians to be a part of the 120-member National Youth Orchestra of the U.S.A.
The New Orleans native has been playing the cello since she was 5 years old.
The musician credits a music camp in Haiti that she attended with her mother when she was young with sparking her interest in the cello.
“It was so unreal,” Montes said about playing for the legendary Yo-Yo Ma on MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry Show. “It was amazing cause the way everything happened it was just kind of miraculous that it all worked out in the very end.”
Montes said she was “very excited” to be chosen for the National Youth Orchestra. “I was ecstatic when I found out the news.”
The orchestra starts off their world tour at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and will then travel to Moscow, St. Petersburg and London.
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