Winter Song: Choir Performs Holiday Concert Tonight

Danielle Dalton, Guest Reporter

Choir students have been working on their music for tonight’s winter show in the cafeteria at 7 p.m.

“We always look and try to find something that is engaging both for the singers and the audience,”choir director Steve White said. “Honestly, we try to do things that are a little bit off the beaten path so we don’t just give you five different versions of ‘Silent Night’.”

Since the beginning of November, the six choirs consisting of: Concert Men,Concert Women, Acapella, Chorale, Sirens, and Ovation have been working on mastering their holiday music.

“We’re performing three songs called ‘A Winters Night,’ ‘Ding-a-ding-a-ding,’ and ‘Deck the Halls.’” Senior and Ovation member Taylor James said. “I’m most excited about performing ‘A winters Night’ because of the way it fits together and how the blend is just so gorgeous.”

The concert will now be held in the cafeteria since the auditorium has become too small for the choirs growing audience.The program this year will involve a variety of things, such as audience participation in a song that Siren’s is singing called ‘Jerusalem’ which will involve the girls moving in and around the audience.

“The audience is not going to know what to do with us cause we’ll be walking beside them. Its a neat thing because you feel like you’re in the group as they’re performing,” White said. “I’m excited to see how it pulls off. Another group called Acapella is doing two pieces from a work called ‘A Ceremony of Carols’, which is neat and fun to hear. Chorale is doing a piece called ‘Snow Angel’ which is going to be a first time Texas premiere. Its a major work, five movements with piano and cello and some percussion as well. No one in Texas has yet to hear it before, until now.”

With the concert being held on Dec. 4, the choirs had the Thanksgiving break in between the big show.

“It will be a little difficult in the beginning to get back into the swing of things, but I believe that we have 90-95 percent of our music memorized, so I’m not worried,” James said. “I try to go over my music in my head and see how memorized I am on all the pieces, and then go back the next day and review the parts that I missed.”

Ultimately, it is a team effort between the directors and students to find just the right music for the shows.

“Ideally, we have a clear idea of every single measure and note. There is a concept. Is it crescendoing, getting softer, is this part loud or soft, what kind of color do we want here? Every note we have an exact idea of what it wants to do. That’s the goal here.”

 

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