SCHENECTADY — As a kid, Ayden Chrisman had “no interest” in music.
Then, Empire State Youth Orchestra came to Yates Magnet Elementary School to perform and talk about a new, free after-school program. Suddenly, the then-7-year-old was clutching an application, contemplating making a break for it well before the final bell.
“I had a sudden urge to run home and tell my mom, ‘I want you to sign this immediately,’ ” Chrisman recalled during a recent rehearsal break in that very same program, CHIME.
Not too long after getting his mother’s signature, Chrisman plucked a slip of paper reading “violin” from a hat at his first CHIME rehearsal. A decade later, he is a concertmaster for the ever-growing program and preparing to start college as a music major at The Hartt School, a prestigious conservatory at Connecticut’s University of Hartford…