- We started with two songs, mainly to prepare for a small performance of open house. The songs were a spiritual called "The Water is Wide" and "Maybe This Time" from Cabaret.
- We took those songs on the road (on the city bus mind you), and performed at Palo Verde High School with the few middle school choruses left in the district.
- Through suggestions from the judge, we began a more focused concentration on our MOUTHS...
- Jaque O was "commissioned" to create, draw a "Rolling Stone" type mouth on the east side of the room. Brigette volunteered her Rolling Stone poster as a guide
- All year we worked on proper mouth position and sound production
- We prepared for a very busy December by performing at 3 places in 1 week!
- Performance 1-@ Tucson High...Handels' "See The Conquering Hero Comes!" (The Students didn't take too well to this song from one of the masters...gotta work on that for next year!)
- Performance 2-@ Annual Band/Orchestra Concert-We do this every year and a great collaboration with the instrumental music department.
- Performance 3-@ the State Capitol. We try to make this an annual event and use it as a good recruiting tool. Unfortunately it is very costly and will probably result in a $25.00 participation fee for all choral students next school year. (Can be a tax-credit write off though!)
- We then started working on our next project, a spring concert in March which featured songs that we worked on at the beginning of the year, plus some new ones, like Gershwin pieces, American folk/game songs (Charlottetown and Cripple Creek), Simple Harmony songs (Music, Music, Music and Maple Leaf Rag)
- We found a group of "lunch bunchers" who want to take the lead in making chorus one of the strengths of Mansfeld!
- Our final project was to perform songs from different cultures for a performance that featured folklorico, mariachi and a salsa contest! We studied songs from the Czech republic (learned about the polka!), Japan (timely as the earthquake brought this song some relevance), and from many countries in South America! (It meant we had to sing in Spanish!) Our vocal skills had a workout!!
- While the chorus did not connect to another country, they laid the groundwork for a connection and will probably connect to a small school in Peru next year! Much of that will be discussed on the following blog site, http://bbworldstage.blogspot.com/ as well as this one.
- We finished off the year watching the classic "Singing in the Rain." I felt it best that the students see the entire show, know who the actors/dancers/singers are rather than getting a skewed view through "Glee."
I am so proud of the students who stuck it out through the year. We cover so much and it is difficult to list all the accomplishments we made, but the biggest item of note is that we have a big "family" of singers and we all try very hard to support each other. Even though we lose some to promotion, we take pride in the fact that they take with them a great choral attitude and will continue to represent their Mansfeld experience wherever they go. We become a larger network every year! See you in the fall!
