Daily Sitka Sentinel

SHS Musicians Go All Out at All-State Festival

By SHANNON HAUGLAND

Sentinel Staff Writer

Weeks of preparing audition material and learning new pieces paid off for a group of high school musicians at the All-State Music Festival Nov. 17 through 19 in Anchorage.

The six Sitka High musicians spent their three days at the festival in intensive rehearsals preparing for performances in treble choir, mixed choir, band and orchestra. 

Sitka High musicians, from left, Maya Reda-Williams, Amanda Roe, Lucy Poulson, Brooklyn Sudnikovich-Eddy, Ella Lubin and Elias Erickson stand on stage at the West Anchorage High School auditorium after performing. (Sentinel Photo)

The program featuring 16 pieces of music was performed Nov. 19 at the West Anchorage High School auditorium, with hundreds in attendance. It was also broadcast statewide on Thanksgiving Day, and on GCI channel 1 in Sitka.

Brooklyn Sudnikovich-Eddy, a junior, said she was pleased to have been selected to perform bass clarinet in the band, based on her audition piece. Brooklyn also plays clarinet, alto and bass saxophone, violin and piano. 

“It was very exciting,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting to make it, so when I did I was very excited.”

She liked the three days of preparation with the other Sitka students in the all-state band who were just as enthused about music as she is.

“It’s kind of like the next level,” she said. “Everyone is that much more focused and prepared.”

Her favorite piece was “Song for Lindsay,” by Andrew Boysen. In all, the band prepared five pieces to perform at the concert.

“They were challenging enough so it was a good challenge, but not impossibly difficult,” Brooklyn said. “It was a good variety: a slow song, a march, a fanfare ... It was some of everything.”

She added that she and her fellow musicians also enjoyed watching their peers perform in choirs and the orchestra at the Nov. 19 concert.

Brooklyn said the most nerve-wracking exercise was playing a random sample for adjudicators in order to be assigned a chair. But she apparently rose to the challenge – she earned second chair in her bass clarinet section.

Students selected for all-state are given the festival selections in advance, and are expected to be prepared when they meet their guest conductor for the first practice at the festival. Conductors came from university and high school programs from around the country.

“There were definitely high expectations going into rehearsal,” said Ella Lubin, a sophomore who was first chair in the band’s trombone section, and also played in the all-state orchestra. Her big challenge was receiving one of the pieces just a few days before the festival. “Getting accepted into all-state you were expected to have it learned, then it’s making it sound beautiful. It was very intense.”

Like Brooklyn, Ella agreed the concert for all the groups came out well.

“The finished product was amazing,” she said. Ella’s favorite among the orchestra pieces was Cappricio Espagnol, by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

Both girls said they enjoyed the company of other musicians, as well as the chance to see some of their friends from Sitka Fine Arts Camp.

Lucy Poulson, a sophomore who plays tuba, said she, too, liked being around other musicians who enjoy practicing their instruments.

“Being surrounded by a whole bunch of people who are dedicated to music was incredible,” she said.

As a tuba player, she took a liking to “His Honor,” a march by Henry Fillmore.

“Marches are really fun for tubas,” Lucy said. She was one of seven tubas in the all-state band.

Having a new conductor took some adjusting. “It was a little strange at first,” Lucy said. The guest conductor was Kirt Saville of Brigham Young University in Utah. “After the first couple of hours it was easy to follow what he wanted us to do,” she said.

She also liked that he challenged the musicians to think about what they were doing in a new way. “I really liked him as a conductor,” she said.

As for what it was like being in a section of seven tubas: “It was really loud.”

Sitka High music director Sarah Martinson played trumpet in the all-state band when she was at Chugiak High. Living in the Anchorage area, she had the chance growing up to play in larger groups, but that’s generally a new experience for most Sitka kids.

“It’s just really cool,” she said. “I can imagine, being from here, not being in large orchestras or band – it’s cool to get to go and play with other people. It gives our students a new perspective in what’s possible, and to be surrounded by other high achievers. It pushes you to be better. Only a few kids get to experience that but it’s special to be part of it.”

Amanda Roe, a senior, agreed.

“It was really cool to get in a group of 90 kids,” said Amanda, who was the only girl singing tenor in the all-state mixed choir. “It was just great.”

Her favorite piece was “The Sweetheart of the Sun,” by Eric W. Barnum, which she said sounds the simplest but was actually the most difficult.

“It was the hardest to dynamically get right,” she said. Singers had to keep their eyes on the conductor, who would direct them to raise or lower their volume. The conductor kept his eyes closed while expecting the singers to keep a close eye on him for direction.

“He was smiling and conducting,” Amanda said. “It was great – the majority of the time he was smiling and closing his eyes.”

The experience left an impression.

“I miss it a lot,” she said. “It was odd to go from a group of 80 or 90 to 18 (in Sitka High’s chamber choir).”

Martinson said the audition process to be selected is fairly grueling.

“We spent a lot of days and nights recording together,” she said. After recording an audition piece, the kids are sent home to listen to themselves, think about what they need to improve, and come back to school to work on it after hours with Martinson.

“It’s a lot of work,” Martinson said. “I encourage them to audition. Every year we have more and more kids audition.”

Other Sitka High musicians who performed at the festival were Elias Erickson, a percussionist in his junior year, who was in the All-State Band; and Maya Reda-Williams, a senior, who was in the All-State Treble Choir.