Editor’s note: The “Who is Syracuse?” series runs in The Daily Orange every spring to highlight individuals who embody the spirit of Syracuse University. The D.O. encouraged members of the campus community to nominate people who fit this description, and The D.O. selected the final eight nominees. This series explores their stories.

Halfway down an aisle in an empty Setnor Auditorium, Dreya Cherry leaned on an armrest. She glanced to her right and spotted a couple friends rehearsing with the Syracuse University concert band.

A smile spread across her face and she waved quickly. Her friend tossed a quick wave back.

“I know them from First Year Players,” Cherry said.

Those brief waves, exchanges of grins and random hellos are a daily occurrence, Cherry said. It’s because of the community she’s immersed herself in at SU.

Since coming to Syracuse, Cherry has been involved with First Year Players, a theater group for freshmen and transfer students. She’s currently the pit manager, in charge of instrumental music and the pit orchestra for shows. Now a senior, Cherry is set to move on from the community that’s done so much for her, the community she’s helped build. But not before she gives back.

“It’s an organization that, yes, we put on a musical, but it’s a lot more than that,” Cherry, a music industry major, said. “It’s very much about the community you build and the family you have and the people you get to meet.”

Cherry’s senior year with FYP has been defined by a big project: creating the first pit orchestra with only first-year students. In the past, the pit has been open to all students.

When the show’s producers approached her with the idea for this year’s show, “Young Frankenstein,” Cherry took the challenge head on.

“The 16 first-years we had in the pit are incredible people,” Cherry said. “Incredible musicians.”

This change was something that people in FYP were unsure about, even pit members, but Cherry had pushed for it and wasn’t going to let her team fail.

And it didn’t. Almost everything went off without a hitch — except opening night. Everyone was set, the music had been rehearsed as best it could be. It seemed there would be no issues, until a cellist didn’t show.

Pit member Abby Tubis said Cherry, a bassoonist, grabbed the cello sheet music and played the whole part on piano.

“From what I heard, it was all her work that made it into a first-year pit. It was her enthusiasm for pit,” Tubis, communications sciences and disorder major said.

But what Cherry has done for FYP and so many others reaches far beyond a pit in front of a stage.

It’s the little things, not grandiose gestures, that make Cherry stand out. She’ll send encouraging text messages to her pit members, unprompted. She’ll meet anyone for lunch or coffee, just to talk. During technical week — the week of rehearsals leading up to opening night — when everyone was tired and stressed, she ended the nights by telling everyone that no matter what, she still loved all of them.

Cherry went even further for Tubis. Cherry and Tubis are both Jewish, and when Cherry found out that Tubis, a freshman, wasn’t going home for Passover in March, she invited the freshman to her apartment for a seder dinner.

“She’s so sweet. She’s just a mentor for me,” Tubis said.

When Cherry originally came to Syracuse as a bassoonist, she wasn’t entirely sure how much she wanted to get involved or where she wanted to do it. She was a member of the marching band, which she loved, but the season is only active in the fall.

During her first season in marching band, one of her friends recommended First Year Players. Cherry checked it out, auditioned and got a part in that year’s show, “The Addams Family.” After that, she was hooked.

Only freshmen and transfer students can perform in FYP. So after her first year, Cherry became a staff member, which is open to upperclassmen. She started as a general staff member her sophomore year, then served as pit liaison, the link between the pit orchestra and the rest of the cast and crew, her junior year. This year, she ran the show as a pit manager.

The love she felt as a freshman kept her in the staff for the next three years. She said she met some of the most influential people in her life that first year and she wanted everyone who came after her to feel that same care and support.

So far, she’s succeeded.

Evan Lewis, a junior physics and applied mathematics double major and marching band member, joined FYP after Cherry encouraged everyone in marching band to audition. Lewis, then a freshman, went for it and is still involved two years later.

The pair became good friends, and Cherry is always there when Lewis needs her, he said.

“She is like my comfort zone in that organization,” Lewis said.

Tubis feels the same way. She refers to herself and Cherry as kindred spirits. That’s partially because they’re both bassoonists, but more so because of how much Tubis sees herself in Cherry. She hopes to one day be as influential for others as Cherry was for her.

“She always commits herself to the happiness of other people,” Tubis said.

Above all else, Cherry spreads love to those around her. Lewis and Tubis both were sure to use the term “unconditional love.”

So did Cherry. For her, love is like a currency and the value is in loving others — spending the time and energy to make other people feel as safe and cherished. In a few weeks, Cherry will graduate and head to Carnegie Mellon for graduate school, where she’ll pursue a masters in arts management.

Even though she’ll be gone physically, the ones Cherry has loved in Syracuse won’t forget, and they’ll try to pass that love along to the next generation of First Year Players.

“So much unconditional love,” Cherry said.

Published on April 25, 2018 at 11:06 pm

Contact Andrew: aegraham@syr.edu | @A_E_Graham