Sing, Sing, Sing!

"I joined the choir today," said Noah. Jason and I looked at each other in surprise. Noah isn't the type to volunteer for much, but last fall, when he started attending school, he started playing intramural sports at lunch hour--that is, on the days when it didn't interfere with lunch hour choir practice.

We were thrilled to find that he really enjoys it. For their first performance, he was one of only two or three boys--now that number has increased to a handful out of forty kids. But that's okay--when he's singing, he has the biggest grin on his face, and you can tell he really enjoys it.

This spring, the school choir entered our local Music Festival, which took place about a month ago. They did so well, they were recommended to the Provincial Music Festival in Edmonton, which took place last Friday. In between, they also went to the Grande Prairie Music Festival, and did pretty well there, too. I was fortunate enough to be at all three performances--and actually part of the last one, as their high-school-student percussionists couldn't make the trip to Edmonton. So, I got to play the djembe! (Don't laugh, fellow music alumni--I know I sucked at keeping time in college, but I've come a long way since then. Plus, it was only 2 measures repeating for the whole song.)

Here is the original Festival performance, for which they received the highest award given in our local festival:

In G.P. they got fairly high, as well. I don't know what they got for a mark last weekend, but the experience itself was a reward, as was just having made it that far. That is the first time these kids, this choir (which the director only started three years ago), or the director/music teacher (who has been teaching locally for about 20 years, I think she said) have ever made it to Provincials, so just being included in our province's best school choirs was an honour. And the other four choirs we were privileged to listen to on Friday morning were amazing, and such a joy to listen to!

(The drum on stage was the one I got to play. I had to stop taking pictures after this to go hold it and pose.)

 Jason took two days off work to stay with Levi so I could be a parent supervisor for the trip. It is about five and a half hours of driving between here and Edmonton, so it was no quick "go-and-come-back-today" type of deal--we got to stay in a hotel downtown, and they also included a trip to the Telus World of Science on Thursday afternoon for us.

Plus, it was basically two days that I just got to hang out with Noah. So awesome.

Before heading home, there was lunch and about 45 minutes of shopping at the Kingsway Mall. One of the kids bought "Frozen" at the mall, which was the movie selection of choice for the ride home. (Surprise.) The coolest was listening to a bus full of choir kids belting out the songs from "Frozen" along with the movie at the top of their lungs on the way home--and doing a great job of it! (Maybe my favourite part of the trip.)

Happy Wednesday, friends!