This past Wednesday through Friday I was at Region Chorus in Oil City. I had been given a month to learn a folder full of eight highly advanced choral pieces, which is not a simple task. The Monday after I had returned home from District Chorus, I went to work learning my new folder of music. I knew I had to perfect the music in one month and had no time to waste. At first, I struggled with the music. It was very difficult music to try and figure out and learn. That made me very nervous. The first couple weeks of trying to learn the music were tough. But after asking Ms. McMonigal for help with my part, I was starting to get the hang of it. Everyday the music was improving. When there was about two weeks left until the festival began, I was able to focus on dynamics and where to breath in the songs. I was starting to fine tune the pieces of music.
When the time finally came to leave for Regions last Wednesday, I was nervous. I had been able to move on to State Chorus last year, so I had expectations for myself. Once we arrived at the high school, all of the soprano ones were taken into a room together and told what their audition selections are. Two pieces were selected and I was, not overly confident, but confident none the less with the sections. I was seven out of twenty girls to audition. At Districts I was last out of twenty-five girls, so seventh was a nice change. I was nervous enough, and having to wait too long would have made it worse. After my audition, I felt pretty good with it. It was over at that point, so even if I thought I had messed up majorly, I could not do anything about it anyways. The rest of the night was spent practicing and sleeping.
The next morning, we practiced for a couple of hours before the chairs were announced. I had though about what would happen if I did not make it to State Chorus a lot and had decided that whatever happened, happened. It was not in my control. Once they started announcing chairs, I was nervous. Once they started announcing soprano one chairs, I was extremely nervous. They announce the top ten chairs, but only the top four move on to states. Last year I got fourth chair. So, for the beginning of the chair placement announcements, you are praying that they do not say your name, but once they announce the fifth chair, you are praying that they do say your name. But of course, my luck had run out. "Fifth Chair, from Bradford, Mandi Droney." Ugh. What did I do wrong? I was so disappointed. I was so close. But what was done was done and I could not do anything about it.
By the end of the day, I was fine. I had not even cried a tear, which was surprising. The next day, Ms. McMonigal received our scores. I had tied with the girl that had received fourth chair and they had to do a triple tie-breaker within the individual categories to decide who got fourth chair and who got fifth. All I could think was, "What if they had looked at the categories in a different order to decide who moved on to states? Why, of course, did the scores have to be so close? I would have rather been hundreds of points apart, not tied."
I will always be very disappointed with my placement at Regions, but I have a lot to be thankful for even though I am not going to State Chorus. 1. I have another year of chorus festivals to participate in next year. I have another chance. 2. I am going to All East Chorus in April, which is an opportunity that a lot of the people that made it to State Chorus this year do not even have. So even though I did not make it to States this year, I am okay because I have another year of opportunities and another year to work hard for something I want.
