With Christmas right around the corner, it’s not unusual to be spreading cheer all around. On Dec. 15, the band and chorus performed at the annual Christmas concert. If one were present, they would have noticed the students that filled the auditorium with joyful music.
The Freedom Big Red Band does many things over the course of the beginning of the year, starting out with marching band. Now, the concert band and chorus members have been working on their music for the Christmas concert. They started soon after marching band season and have been working to perfect their music for the concert.
This year, the band played “Holiday Piece,” “Christmas on Broadway,” “A Christmas Festival” and “Holiday Favorites.” In these pieces, the band will be playing tunes from “Jingle Bells,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and other holiday classics.
“Christmas on Broadway” offered some parts for senior features, with Aaron James, Hannah Shumsky, Nikki Kammer and Michael Fricke playing a quartet and Joey Pail with a solo.
“To prepare for this year’s Christmas concert, we have been practicing very hard in and out of class. We pride ourselves in practicing outside of class to better our program because we don’t want to let the others down. This not only makes us better players, due to the challenging music, but it also makes us better team members. KK makes the band a family and makes us all better players. He helps anyone who comes to him. We become better players by learning off of each other and that’s why the band program is so special,” sophomore Kassandra DePoppe said.
Along with the concert band, the jazz band also plays. In jazz band, they played “Santa Claus is Coming to Town,” ”Swing the Songs of Christmas” and “We Three Kings.” Soloists for jazz band pieces included seniors Nikki Kammer, Joey Pail and Kameron Mayhue.
“I like ‘We Three Kings’ because it is a challenging piece where Joey [Pail] and Kameron [Mayhue] get to shine with solos, as well as the unique and complicated basslines,” junior Dante Colorito said.
The chorus members sang “Christmas Jazz,” “Baby Born in Bethlehem,” “White Christmas” with the featured duet, senior, Aaron James and Mr. Keith Kovalic, and “North Pole Rock and Roll” with the featured soloist, junior Rebekah Shumsky. The choir also sang along to “Holiday Favorites” with the band.
As well as the many performers already in the show, the eighth grade choir joined, singing along with the high school and did their own performance of “That’s What Christmas Means to Me.”
“Our group is definitely a good group. There is a lot of vocal talent. Everyone tries their best to get our music memorized and we always are focused on the task at hand. Our concert will be a good one,” freshman Myah Hrinko stated.
With the Christmas concert now completed, the band and chorus members will soon start to prepare for the spring concert in May.