Like their counterparts at Liberty High School, jazz band students at Heritage High are steadily raising funds for their trip to the 2010 Pacific Basin Music Festival in Hawaii in March.

Both bands were accepted to the prestigious international music program, in which students collaborate with musicians from Australia, Japan, Singapore and the Kingdom of Tonga. It will cost each student approximately $1,500 to pay for admission to the program, airfare to Hawaii, meals and personal expenses.

Heritage has been hosting fundraising events all school year, but as the trip is only seven weeks away, the band is kicking its fundraising into high gear with a special Spring Swing Fling on Friday, Feb. 5.

“We’ve done a lot of fundraising in the past year,” said Heritage Band Director Steve Ernest. “We’ve held car washes, sold cookie dough, worked the CornFest cleaning up trash, and we’ve done guest performances at the Brentwood Chamber of Commerce mixer and at the Streets of Brentwood, but we wanted to put together one last big event that the entire community can enjoy.”

The Spring Swing Fling will be an evening of fine dining and dancing. Guests will be treated to a lasagna dinner while the Heritage Jazz Band plays classic swing songs. The students will be joined by the Summerset Big Band, which will help keep the party going while Cozette Hileman of Red Door Dance Studio provides ballroom dance lessons so that guests will be jumping and jiving like the pros.

Tickets are $15 for adults, $25 for a couple and $10 for students and seniors. Guests are encouraged to dress in swing-era apparel as awards will be given for best dressed.

“This is our last big push for fundraising,” said Ernest “We’ve been chipping away at the cost, but $1,500 per student is a lot of money with the way things are with the economy. The students are really excited, though. We’ve got 43 students signed up to go to Hawaii, and it should be an experience of a lifetime. We’re all looking forward to it.”

The Spring Swing Fling will be held at the Brentwood Senior Center, 193 Griffith Lane, from 6:30 to 10 p.m. All proceeds will be donated to the Heritage High School Jazz Band.

For more information, e-mail Liz Elsasser at elizabethelsasser@sbcglobal.net.