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DC Flutes performed a medley of Lizzo songs at Wolf Trap’s Filene Center on July 7, opening the evening before the singer took the stage in Vienna.

The appearance was the ensemble’s largest-audience performance to date. It also brought student musicians into an event built around the flute: Lizzo is a classically trained flutist and had planned to reimagine her hits with the National Symphony Orchestra. The concert was scheduled to begin at 8 p.m.

A preview of the performance said approximately 30 student flutists were expected to join DC Flutes onstage. The scheduled participants represented the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, D.C. Youth Orchestra Program, Maryland Classic Youth Orchestras and Baltimore Symphony Youth Orchestras.

“Having the kids involved just makes it that much more special,” said Aaron Goldman, a DC Flutes co-conductor and principal flutist with the National Symphony Orchestra.

One of the musicians who performed was Chris Li, a 17-year-old member of DC Flutes and the Baltimore Symphony Youth Orchestra. Li had also performed with the Maryland All State Youth Orchestra and the Boston University Tanglewood Institute.

The Filene Center was already familiar to Li from summers spent attending performances at Wolf Trap. This time, he was on the stage himself as part of the Lizzo program, turning a place connected to childhood concertgoing into the setting for one of his own performances.

The experience extended backstage. Li said the musicians met Lizzo, took photographs with her and joined her in a flute trill.

“We took pictures with her, and we did the Lizzo trill together, and it was a lot of fun — she was such a great person,” Li said.

The scale of the backstage area also made an impression. “The backstage at Wolf Trap is the largest I’ve ever seen in my life,” Li said. “It was like an airplane hangar.”

Preparing for the performance required attention to a practical feature of the partly open-air Filene Center. Goldman checked that the musicians’ stands had clips so wind would not send their sheet music blowing away.

Goldman had been playing the flute since he was 6. Li came to the instrument by a different route: He first played piano, then began playing the flute in fourth grade.

For Li, the Wolf Trap performance and meeting with Lizzo added a new milestone to a musical life already shaped by several youth ensembles. His description of the instrument’s place in that life was direct: “I don’t think my life would be the same without flute or music.”

The evening placed that commitment before DC Flutes’ largest audience yet, while connecting student performers from across the region with professional musicians and one of popular music’s most prominent flutists.