Luzerne County (and Beyond's) Got Talent hits all the high notes
Mar. 26—WILKES-BARRE — At the top of the show, before ceding the stage to 25 of the area's most talented acts, Luzerne County (and Beyond's) Got Talent chair Andrea Bogusko said it best.
"There's nothing that unites people more than music," Bogusko said, and a packed to capacity Kirby Center crowd couldn't have agreed more.
After a smash hit debut last year, the Northeast PA Music Teachers Association put on their second-ever Luzerne County's Got Talent competition, with the finals held Sunday on the grand stage of the Kirby.
As the new name indicates, this year's talent competition wasn't just limited to Luzerne County participants, with several acts coming from "Beyond'" the county's borders.
When the dust settled, the dancing duo of Robert Zaloga and Tess Parchinski won the judge's prize of $1,000 for their performance of a number from "The Nutcracker," while Mason Rinehimer won first place in the audience vote for his dance number, set to "Feeling Good" by Michael Bublé.
Rinehimer, a student at Dallas Middle School, had a large, fiercely devoted cheering section who exploded into cheers at his introduction to perform and again when he was announced as the first place audience vote winner and handed a check for $750.
"I'm feeling amazing right now," Rinehimer said after the show. "It pushes me so much, to see how much support I really have."
Additional audience prizes in the amount of $500 and $250 were awarded to second-place finisher Jimmy Stranger, who wowed the crowd with a soulful rendition of Chris Isaak's "Wicked Game," and the third-place act from the Joan Harris Centre.
An all-boys class at the Centre, the group performed a dance number paying homage to a number of hit songs from the 1980s, most prominently Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock 'n Roll," with the members of the group dressed like Tom Cruise from the 1983 film "Risky Business," which features the Seger song in an iconic scene.
These four winners were chosen from a field of 25 finalists, which in turn needed to be whittled down from a larger pool of auditions submitted to the Luzerne County's Got Talent committee.
The finalists encompassed a number of different performance disciplines, singers and dancers, pianists and guitarists and even a drummer (Tylor Berrini, who put on a truly unique dance/drum hybrid performance set to "Rock 'n Roll" by Led Zeppelin).
The competition was emceed by state Rep. Eddie Day Pashinski, who gave the audience a bit of background on each performer as they made their way onto the stage.
No stranger to the stage himself, Pashinski also performed a few tunes while the audience votes were being tallied, as did committee member and PA Live! host Chris Bohinski.
Additional entertainment was provided by house band MK3 and the Wilkes University Jazz Ensemble.
Proceeds from Sunday's competition will go directly toward scholarships for music students looking to pursue their dreams into college. Two scholarships were announced on Sunday by Bogusko, with more to be announced in June.
Besides the scholarship funds, the goal behind Luzerne County (and Beyond's) got Talent has been to showcase just how many talented people call this area home.
On that count, Sunday's show found the mark in a major way.
"We're so very excited to present this program," Bogusko said in opening the show. "I think you're really going to be amazed at the talent you'll see."
