The Jesuit chamber choir departed to Westview High School on April 3 to compete in the annual Metro League choir competition. At 9:30, the first slot, the group took the stage to showcase their five songs, and hoped that the judges would admire their passion and prowess.
“We performed our league competition set, called Musings, at the spring concert,” senior Jameson Gonzalez said.
The singers are judged on four categories: quality of sound, technique, musicality, and other factors, or more specifically, literature and stage presence. Each of these categories can earn them 100 points – except for “other factors” where they can earn 30 points. In total, the team can earn up to 330 possible points.
“It’s cool that we have this goal to work towards, in hopes of a mountaintop performance experience for the judges to reward on wednesday,” choir teacher Ms. Caldwell said in an email.
The league competition consists of the other 6A metro league schools: Aloha, Beaverton, Mountainside, Southridge, Sunset, and Westview. The main competition for Jesuit will be Westview, the winning team from the previous year.
There are two ways to qualify and move forward to the state competition. The ideal scenario, scoring the highest in league therefore gaining an automatic spot in state. Second, scoring 81 points or more in the three high point categories: quality of sound, technique, and musicality. Scoring an 81 or more would qualify the team for the tape pool, and from there the team can possibly be invited to the state competition.
Jesuit placed on the podium in metro, and through the tape pool, qualified for the upcoming state competition.
As they prepare to take the state competition stage on May 4, the members of the Jesuit choir will be competing against some of the best in the state, the teams from other schools that qualified through the tape pool or winning metro.
