Practice makes perfect

Orchestra students perform in preparation for solo and ensemble

On Monday, Jan. 14 the orchestra students performed their coffee house performances in the cafeteria in preparation for their solo and ensemble competition. They played in the assigned groups with whom they will perform during their evaluations.

The ensembles went on stage one-by-one and played one song each. Parents and students watched the students play while enjoying refreshments provided by the musicians’ families.

“I felt like this was a nice way to let the parents see how much time and effort each ensemble put in, and how much everyone improved from the beginning of the year,” freshman Linda Tran said.

At solo and ensemble, each group will be reviewed on either a state or district evaluation. The state evaluations will take place on Saturday, January 26, and the district evaluations will occur on February 9. This coffee house performance was organized in order to practice performing in front of a crowd with each other. These groups have been practicing every Friday since Nov. 2 in preparations for their performances. These days are called chamber music days.

For the first two weeks of these chamber music days, each group would practice individually. Once the groups had a decent grasp of their music, they were assigned a professional music coach to assist them with their ensembles.

“Although my group had a little bit of a rocky start, we ended up playing pretty well at the coffeehouse thanks to the coaches and the weekly practices,” Tran said. “Performing at the coffeehouse definitely boosted everyone’s confidence to play well at solo and ensemble.”

Each group had various numbers of students that playing different instruments including violins, violas, cellos and basses.

“In my group, we had two first violins, two second violins, two cellos, a viola and a bass,” Tran said.

The Coffeehouse performances were a good way for the orchestra students to bond while working hard and preparing for an upcoming competition. The students were able to evaluate their skills as groups and have fun while doing it.