Holly Connor: The Musical Savant

At about nine months, most babies begin to crawl. At nine months, Holly Connor began playing the piano. 

She has been playing for the past 14 years.

Holly Connor is a talented singer, actress, and composer who just entered her freshman year at CHS. She is an actor, a singer and a musician who has been a part of countless performances. She has perfect pitch, which is the ability to identify a tone (note) without any reference and is incredibly rare. She can also play a variety of musical instruments including the harmonica, takes dance classes including tap and has been in twenty five stage productions as of September 2019. Holly has achieved so much despite her daily obstacle.

Holly is blind and autistic.

Her condition is called septo-optic dysplasia and was caused because her optic nerve never fully developed. She can see some movement a few feet in front of her, but uses braille to read and write. Despite her setbacks, Holly loves to read anything from sheet music to her favorite book series, The Land of Stories. She also loves to write and has composed a number of original music. 

Holly’s favorite class at Clayton is theater arts and her favorite teacher is Kelly Weber with whom she’s really connected. She just auditioned for the jazz band and the freshman-sophomore musical and is ready for the high school arts program.

On the daily, Holly is faced with problems such as students bumping into her in the halls, in class or in the restroom. She can’t see others, and getting bumped in the halls is frazzling and also very stressful. 

Even with the adversities she faces, Holly is determined to embrace her passion and one day sing on Broadway. She plans to use the resources at Clayton High School to further her dreams.