We are located in Rio Rancho, but you don't have to be! The Rio Rancho Youth Chorus welcomes middle & high school aged singers of all backgrounds, styles, cultures, orientations, abilities, identities.
No previous chorus experience is required – you just need to love to sing!
We accept new members twice a year in January/February and again in August/September. 
Rio Rancho Youth Chorus is Rio Rancho's only community youth chorus.
​Everyone is welcome!
Tuition is $150 per season, which includes 10-15 sessions of two-hours of instruction and rehearsal and t-shirt. Full and partial scholarships are available.

Rio Rancho Youth Chorus offers musical instruction in a welcoming, open, and fun environment. RRYC performs various styles of music that will teach the chorus members to learn harmony, recognize and reproduce pitch, have rhythmic accuracy, and be able to focus while the chorus, as a whole, works towards our goals. Through the group’s musical instruction and performance experience, RRYC hopes to instill confidence and self-esteem, skills that will serve our members for life. RRYC unites youth of diverse backgrounds by bringing them together with a common thread of music. RRYC also advances the role of youth in the community by offering a public performance at the end of each season.

We know that there are many kids in our area that are passionate about singing and performing, but as education budgets shrink, so do opportunities for these kids to participate and engage in musical activities. RRYC will teach our members how to sing and make a beautiful sound within a group, to exercise their performance skills, socialize with their peers and the community, and develop skills that will be useful throughout their lives.

Participants are encouraged to bring a prepared audition piece to the audition, though this is not required.

The RRYC rehearses every Saturday, 2:00pm-4:00pm, September through December, and February through May. Weekly rehearsals at RRYC begin with warm-ups for two purposes: to physically prepare the chorus members’ voices for singing, and to teach vocal technique. After warm-ups, chorus members will spend time working on repertoire for concerts. Chorus members should always have their music and a pencil with them (provided by the artistic director throughout each season). Parents are invited to sit in on rehearsals as observers.

At the end of each season, members' efforts will culminate in a performance for the community.

Clarissa Clark has been a music educator and church musician in New Mexico for over 35 years. After graduating from the University of New Mexico, she began her career teaching in the Las Cruces Public Schools in 1990, teaching at Picacho, Vista, and Zia Middle Schools. In 1993, Clarissa returned to Albuquerque, where she began a 28-year career in the Albuquerque Public Schools as a choral and orchestral director, musical theater instructor, piano and guitar teacher for Rio Grande High School, Ernie Pyle Middle School, Eldorado High School, and Volcano Vista High School. An active church musician, she served as the Assistant Director of Music for First United Methodist Church, Youth choir director for Monte Vista Christian Church, and Chancel Choir director at West Mesa Christian Church. Clarissa loves musical theater and throughout her career has stage-directed and been the music director for Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Bye Bye Birdie, Bring Back Birdie, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Guys and Dolls, Grease, Little Shop of Horrors, Cinderella, Into the Woods, and Oklahoma! After a brief 3 month retirement from public education in 2017, Clarissa accepted a position as the choral director and, served as Fine Arts Department Chair at St. Pius Catholic School, retiring in 2024. Additionally, she served on the NMAA Choral Advisory Board, and the NMMEA Executive Board as Choral Vice President(2018-2020) and is a member of NAfME and ACDA. Having grown up in Rio Rancho, Clarissa is thrilled to see the development of the youth arts programs through Rio Rancho Creative Crossroads and is looking forward to working with the talented singers in the Rio Rancho Youth Chorus.

Star Heights Receration Center
Located  at 800 Polaris Blvd, Rio Rancho 
A special thanks to Rio Rancho Parks & Rec for graciously allowing us to use their space for rehearsals.