Let It Be- Xavier

One of the best songs I've heard all this year was Xavier's "Let it Be." The thing that made this song was the soloist. She is simply amazing. She has pure talent, as I knew her from when she was six or seven singing "Don't Rain on my Parade." Her voice is perfect for this song, and although some say that the solo is too long, I wish that the solo would keep going. When I heard it at the Kennedy Invitational, it gave me goosebumps. Kudos to you!

The song is also one of the greatest songs ever written. It is one the Beatles' best, as it's tune is strong as well as the words. I really think that Xavier gives the song justice.

And back to show choir...

So this weekend was a very exhausting weekend for my show choir, Happiness, Inc. We all arrived at school yesterday at 6:30 in the morning, and we got on the charter buses at 7:00 to leave for Urbandale, Iowa which is two and half hours away. As soon as we got there we started getting settled in our room and checking out the school. The theatre was amazing, with a balcony that had been specially made for music and acoustics. The whole school was new, and everything looked really nice.

The competition for us was Ankeny, Linn-Mar, Johnston, and Waukee. These are all great show choirs, with Ankeny ranking 1st nationally according to the Show Choir Rating System for 2008. Earlier in this season, we had beaten Ankeny and it was a great success for us. We couldn't believe that we had beaten the number one show choir in the nation. At this same competition we had also beaten Waukee and Johnston, but since Linn-Mar held this same competition, we had no idea how we compared to them (except for the Show Choir Rating System for 209 which had Linn-Mar at second and us at fourteenth going into the competition). So we were pretty anxious competing at Urbandale. We wanted to prove that us beating Ankeny at the Linn-Mar competition was justified and worthy, and we wanted to prove that we could beat Linn-Mar. Linn-Mar and Kennedy have always had a friendly competition between them, and we've always wanted to beat one another.

So we performed at 4:50 and everyone seemed to feel good about the show. We had a pretty good critique (the time when a judge from the panel comes and talks to us about our show and how we can improve it). The critique said that he loved our show. He thought it was amazing. Then he went on to tell us some things that we needed to change and fix. He said that we needed to work on our diction in the second song, our emotion in the ballad and the fourth song, and our cleanliness of our moves in the last quarter of the last song. So we had some things to fix for the night round- the finals.

Day round awards came next. Our prep group-Protege- won first in their division. They were all extremely happy, but most of Happiness was only worried about their results. For the day round, Linn-Mar suprisingly got fifth, behind Waukee and Johnston, fourth and third respectively. We got second for the day round behind Ankeny. We were behind them by five measly points. We knew we had to bring it during the night to beat them.

So we tried our best. We, I mean most of us, really got focused on our show. We wanted to put on the best show possible, and hope that would mean we would beat Ankeny. So the show came and gone, and we all thought we had done a pretty great job- except for the ballad which had some intonation problems. In the end, Ankeny ended up receiving best vocals and best choreography, which made them Grand Champions and us second. However, I wasn't that dissatisfied. Coming into this season, before Linn-Mar, Happiness had no intentions of ever beating Ankeny. They are basically show choir gods, so we didn't even think we had a chance of getting close to them. Yeah, beating them was really cool, but we should've realized that our expectations had to start all over again after Linn-Mar. They were a new group, a revitalized one at Urbandale, and they showed it. However, I'm a very proud of Happiness' accomplishments this year. It's amazing how well we're doing. My expectations have been reached and what has happened is beyond all of my goals.

"Fab Five"

The Fab Five show choir concert is perhaps one of my favorite show choir performances we ever have. It's very different from all of the other performances, but I think it is different in a good way. At all of the other performances, we perform so we can entertain people, but mostly to win a trophy. We practice all year round, and we're basically judged on how well we are as a group by how well we do in the competitions. I think it's funny how show choir is all about competing, and in many ways I think it is wrong (although there's nothing like winning first place). Anyways, the Fab Five concert is unlike any other concert because it is only about making people happy. It's about entertaining people and giving people a good time. The audience is there because they want to have a good time, and by doing this, the groups can be judged on how entertaining they are, instead of being better than one another vocally or visually.

It's one thing to compete against another group to win a prize and to compete against them for pride. No trophy can replace pride, and when there's no trophy, no group can not have pride because they have not been beaten. Although I think my group could've beat all of the other groups in a competition, I think that all of the groups felt a pride for their own group that day. There wasn't a trophy to erase that pride, and that's what makes the Fab Five competition so special and great.

showchoir.com...

...is perhaps one of the oddest websites in the world. How can people care so much about show choir so that they are constantly yearning to see what happens and where? It would seem like they could wait for the results of a competition, for example. For Happiness members, such as I, show choir is about putting on a great show and having fun. For these people on showchoir.com it seems to have become only a competition.

Why is show choir so great?

All we do is dance and sing and act at the same time. How does that prepare us for the real world, because the real world has hardly to do with show choir (unless you perform in a circus or in Las Vegas)? I cannot answer the question, and that is why I am writing about it. I cannot say why I love show choir so much, or why I find it so interesting to compete in. I have been in show choir for six years, but yet there is something that I still don't understand about it. Why do we do it? How do I feel so great while performing a show? Why is it so connected to me and why do so many kids participate? It's fun, yes, but the reason is much deeper than that. Someday, I hope to find the answer.

After all of the difficult and often frustrating rehearsals, there is something that makes you feel accomplished. Walking off the stage in a wide smile with sweat dropping down your costume is the concrete part that makes you feel accomplished, but there is an abstract part that is deep in the soul of the performer that cannot be explained.