Emotional

May 12, 2016

Yesterday was Cabaret and even though I'm not in choir, I still felt that oppressive sense that everything is coming to a rapid end. The theme was Post-1950s Musicals and that meant there were quite a few Wicked songs but everyone was incredible. Voice Male performed "Trashin' the Camp" from Tarzan and Kenny's wolf howls were hilarious.

Zac sang "Empty Chairs at Empty Tables" from Les Mis and I found myself crying not only because Zac's voice is amazing (and eeee I'm so happy he's going to Northwestern for a double degree in Vocal Performance and Econ!), but also because the song is incredibly sad and he performed it so well. Stephie, Aubrey, and Rey performed the "I Love You Song" from The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and it wasn't till the end of the song when I understood the meaning (because I don't know the musical) and then that was when I gasped. "Chimerical. C-H-I-M-E-R-I-C-A-L. Highly unrealistic, wildly fanciful."

When Stephanie and Kyra sang "For Good," I really did cry a bit. Hearing the song took me back all the way to 5th grade where I heard that song nonstop (and didn't get sick of it either) because Kyra was on a massive Wicked kick and that was the one song she would sing. Not Popular, not Defying Gravity, but For Good.

I was so proud of Nikki and her performance of "I'm Not That Girl" from Wicked, and I was swept up in the animated performance of "What Is This Feeling?" also from Wicked, by Cassidy and Anna. Even though the senior class in choir is strong, it's also exciting to know that there are such incredible underclassmen and I'm also a little sad too because I won't be able to see them perform next year (hopefully most of all fine arts concerts will be livestreamed though!).

Also a week ago (May 6) was Superstate and it was a little bittersweet on so many accounts. Firstly, it did suck not to win Superstate last year (although I still maintain that our performance of Husa's "Music for Prague 1968" was incredible and powerful and too bad that the judges said that they couldn't follow the score, we did do the piece justice). It was also sad knowing it would be my last Superstate performance. I also knew that our band wouldn't win because we were so inexperienced (a lot of amazing seniors graduated last year so our band is very new and filled with talented underclassmen, but they still need a few more years in wind ensemble to reach their true potential). And Berlioz's Symphony Fantastique is an incredibly hard piece to play (we played the 4th and 5th movements) since it's a tone poem and because it was written originally for symphony orchestra, and because it's so well-known, it will always inadvertently be compared to the orchestral recording, and no wind ensemble performance, no matter how good, can truly imitate the timbre of a symphony orchestra and all the distinct colors an orchestra can create. So yes, our performance was good, we played our best and we did our wind ensemble transcription justice, but at the same time, we are a wind ensemble and to play Symphony Fantastique is just simply hard.

Despite Krannert being such a big concert hall and my remembrance of it from last year being very boomy and amplifying everything, our performance was exceedingly clear and all of our notes managed to cut through. We received very little criticism and comments from the judges (one judge turned off his mic to enjoy the performance half way through and another judge simply wrote "Congratulations" on her comment sheet haha). Although we didn't win, although there were blips in our performance and some mistakes came up that never happened before in any rehearsal, we still did play our best and oh well, that's all we could do.

So yes, with the end of high school coming to a close, and all these musical ensembles ending too, I can't help but feel emotional because a large part of my time in high school was revolving around music, and it's a little sad to know that no longer will I be able to dedicate such a large portion of my time to music, but I'm also thankful for all the memories I've made and the people I've met and the incredible places I've gone to to perform such awesome repertoire.