All Palatine High musicians will unite to debut song for school’s 150th anniversary

Hours before kickoff for Super Bowl LX, all Palatine High School musicians and choir members will join forces for the debut performance of a song composed specifically to celebrate the school’s 150th anniversary.

Meeting the goal of a piece of music that could be performed by both the orchestra and mariachi students together required enlisting the services of Jose Hernandez — legendary founder of Mariachi Sol de Mexico — for an authentic blending of genres.

Along with lyrics by singer-songwriter Lisa Medina, the wife of Principal Tony Medina, “This is Home” will be publicly performed for the very first time at an hourlong concert at 1 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 8, at the school, 1111 N. Rohlwing Road in Palatine.

Only the musicians and vocalists who are just beginning to rehearse have become familiar with the song already. For all the work that went into its preparation, the end result sounds as effortless as music should, choir director Matt Koehlinger said.

Unique within Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 is the way mariachi is incorporated into its oldest school’s music program.

But the original idea behind the 150th anniversary concert was that all of the school’s more than 200 music students would be performing a song together, orchestra director and Music Department Chair Dung “Yoom” Pham said.

“We want to celebrate the legacy of Palatine High School, including everyone in the community,” she added.

The first thing tried was to retrofit a mariachi piece into an existing composition, but the end result was deemed unsuccessful.

“We needed to go back to the drawing board and come up with something authentic,” Koehlinger said.

When the process began in the fall of 2024, no one knew such a famous musician was going to get the job. While the talent involved was undeniable, the trade-off was that it was somewhat less collaborative, with the frequently touring Hernandez e-mailing files from the road and late in the evening after shows.

Much of his work was done last summer. But knowing the intent of the song very well, Lisa Medina was able to write her lyrics to the completed music within two weeks.

Though Palatine is not specifically mentioned, the lyrics are very evocative of a closely knit school community “where the Pirate flags wave.”

Pham said there’s hope for the song to become more universally known among schools with similar ambitions for their combined music programs — just as there’s a desire to keep adding new compositions to Palatine’s repertoire every couple of years.

But the students now rehearsing are particularly excited to be the first musicians in the world to be interpreting a new composition, Koehlinger said.

Because of the busy schedules of students, a Sunday became the most likely time for the public performance. Additional nuances of the school year dictated that it even be Super Bowl Sunday.

But there probably won’t be regular opportunities for all the school’s musicians to perform together, so Pham hopes the community will recognize the concert as the big deal it is.

Many former members of the music department faculty will be there, and Pham extended a special thanks to the school’s booster clubs for making the whole thing possible.