Hopewell Valley Central High School’s Vox Central Jazz and Con Brio choirs are riding high.
The high school students are relishing their first-place finishes at the National Jazz Festival that was held recently in Philadelphia.
The choirs competed in the national competition on Feb.15 when the groups won top finishes in the inaugural festival that featured high schools and middle schools from across the country.
According to organizers, the festival was created by instrumental and vocal jazz directors, parents, supportive jazz musicians, and avid jazz supporters in an effort to fill the void of a lack of a major national jazz festival with an educational philosophy.
“Some of the students are learning upwards to 20 songs a month in our program. It is heck of a lot for them to memorize, to prepare and present,” said Randy White, the Hopewell Valley High’s choral director. “I feel extremely proud with their performances. The result that they got was a great acknowledgement of their hard work.”
White added that the program is experiencing great ensembles with the students and anticipated the choir performing well in the competition.
“I did believe we would perform to the best of our abilities and we would just have to see what the critics thought,” he said.
Both choir groups are currently “a capella,” a form of singing without instrumental accompaniment, according to White.
The high school’s Vox Central Jazz choir earned a first place in the Vocal Jazz A Cappella category.
“The Jazz choir focuses on jazz repertoire, which has it own harmonic language. It also encourages improvisation,” White said. “Those are two specific jazz traits.”
The choir student members are Piper Ward, Chloe Hulsizer, Genevieve Shaftel, Emma Ababa, Priya Naphade, Elliot Block, Gretchen Cyriacus, Caleb Briggs, Owen Seftor, James McLaughlin, Yezad Nakra, and Emilianne Hatke.
According to school officials, Naphade received the Judge’s Choice award and Shaftel was one of three Outstanding Musician award winners.
The Con Brio choir is an ‘a cappella’ group led by students senior Alex Cross and junior Alex Lehman-Borer. The group took first place in the “Pop-Cappella” category, according to officials.
“Con Brio is more focused on pop music and contemporary music. It features box beaters, which is also featured in the Jazz choir,” White said.
The choir consists of Hopewell Valley High students Stephen Kim, Alex Lehman-Borer, Emma Ababa, Shayla Moon Hermann, Elliot Block, Gretchen Cyriacus, Caleb Briggs, Owen Seftor, James McLaughlin, Yezad Nakra, and Emilianne Hatke.
Lehman-Borer received the Judge’s Choice award and also the Superior Musician award for their musical direction of the ensemble.
“Alex (Lehman-Borer) tries to learn as much as possible from me in each class and takes all of that and leads the group. Alex (Lehman-Borer) is just a great example of what happens to a student when they stick with this choir program for many years,” White said.
According to officials, the Superior Musician is awarded to only one student from all participating “Pop-Cappella” ensembles.
“I was hoping for a good placement, but I think the students were more surprised. I think they took away the idea of if they work towards a common goal, then good results follow,” White said. “That is something I try to encourage my kids to understand. I hope the students had a sense of pride in working together to make something the best it can be.”