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Winter Concert Warms the Heart

    After the hustle and bustle of a long and stressful day at Woodland I was excited to go to the Winter Concert put on by our Fine Arts department. I walked into the calm, quiet auditorium, hit record on my camera, and was ready to hear the sound of choral music.

    Opening the show was Woodland’s Concert Choir, accompanied by a few members of Woodland’s Chamber Choir. The group performed four pieces including “Antiphonal Alleluia,” “Send Down the Rain,” “Inscription of Hope,” and “One Song Many Voices.”

 A highlight of the Concert Choir’s performance was the use of different instruments. Nicholas Barra, Woodland freshman, accompanied on the piano throughout the performance. In “Antiphonal Alleluia,” Matt Murphy and David Terni, both Woodland freshmen, played guitar, Sam Schwind, Woodland sophomore, bass guitar, and Jake Holzman, Woodland freshman, percussion. Schwind and Holzman made a reappearance in “One Song Many Voices.”

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Five female voices performed the next piece, “The Rose.” Being part of an all female choir myself, I had a great interest in how this piece would pan out. When Heather Strandholt, Corinne Marshall, Kasey Officer, Gwen Kirkland, and Morgan Smith, sang out their first chord in a beautiful mezzo piano, I got goose bumps. I ran to get a pen to write, “Stunning” and “Absolutely Beautiful,” in huge letters in my program.

   The tone of each of the five voices blended almost perfectly. Marshall’s obvious control over her beautiful Alto voice blended perfectly with the rich lower notes of Strandholt. Perhaps the most touching and tear-jerking part of this song was Strandholt’s solo matched with the light and heavenly chords of the other performers.

Next, the Chamber Choir took the stage. Their opening piece established the group as a serious, professional-sounding choir. Standing out the most in this piece, was junior tenor, Ryan Frechette. Being one of only three tenors, his tone stood out among the others. Although this may not always be a good thing in choral music, the tone of his voice made me sit back and enjoy the choir as a whole.

The next song, called “Java Jive,” made me do a double take. I thought they were actually talking to me, a self-proclaimed coffee addict as they sang, “I love coffee; I love tea; I love the java jive and it loves me.” The song, was playful, cheery, well-executed, and definitely got a standing ovation from me.
The next two pieces, “Jenny Rebecca” and “Espiritu de Dios,” continued to show the obvious hard work and skill of the choir.

The Chamber choir wrapped up with two winter pieces: “Count Your Blessings Instead of Sheep” and “Snow, Snow, Beautiful Snow.” Again, both were well-executed and showed strong skill and passion for music.
The last performance of the night was a piece with both Chamber and Concert Choir. When I saw that the selection was a Phantom of the Opera medley, I got very excited. I got even more excited when Andrew Jones, senior and Chamber Choir base singer, slipped on the iconic Phantom half-mask.

The piece highlighted some of my favorite songs from the play including “The Phantom of the Opera,” “Think of Me,” “Angel of Music,” “All I Ask of You,” “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again,” and “The Point of No Return.” As I am very familiar with the music, I had very high hopes. The mass choir’s overall lack of energy toward the end of a long concert was a bit of a downer but the medley was still extremely enjoyable.

After packing up my camera and congratulating some friends from the choir on a job well done, I left Woodland knowing that Woodland’s Fine Arts is successfully keeping quality choral music alive and vibrant.

Footage: Theresa Gillette

Editing: Brooke Dragon

One thought on “Winter Concert Warms the Heart

  1. Sarah S April 8, 2010 at 10:12 am

    Just to let everyone know, Ryan is a SOPHMORE not a junior

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