Most students at West think choir is “an easy A” but is it? Or is choir more than that? What does choir mean to students and what makes them love or hate this class?

Choir is an elective, but for most students it’s much more than that- it’s a place where they can go to express themselves. Choir Director, Ms. Katy Green, says, “I think students join choir because they’re looking for a family and a class where they can be themselves and I think and hope they join because they love music.”

Most students may start off not wanting to be in this class but eventually they end up loving choir and stay with it throughout high school and college. Ms. Green said she was upset with her mom for enrolling her in choir but then she began to love it and continued through college and realized everything can be musical.

How do you earn a grade in choir? You can earn a grade by showing up to class and participating every day. Since students only have that class four times a week because of blocking you get a free ten points (50 points a week). You also earn a grade by going to the concerts if students miss concerts they basically fail the class for the semester unless students have a valid reason why they couldn’t make it.

Another way students earn a grade is part checks, which is where she calls you up and you have to sing your part (alto one, alto two, soprano one, soprano two) and you get graded on how well you know your part, and sight reading papers which is when you have to figure out the note without hearing it and sing it correctly. Just like any other class choir students have a final, it is a singing and sight-reading final so students have to stay on top of things.

What does Ms. Green look for in successful choir students? “I look for work ethic and I look for drive and I look for love I look for team-work as much as it pains me to say you have to have the ability to understand musical techniques and be teachable.”

Choir is more than just an elective. Students have to have the ability to understand music and how to improve. When asking Kathryn Postma what choir has taught her she replied, “choir has taught me to be self-motivated and sufficient and learning music and pursuing harder music.”

Students have a love for choir because it’s more than just a class that you have to attend every day or a class that there stuck in because its not required. Choir is a class students learn to love. Choir is a class students can express themselves and not be judged or criticized its a class where the outside world just doesn’t matter and its a class where their problems just don’t exist. This is the one class students don’t have to know each others name and can still be friendly and connect with one another when being in choir students are literally a part of a family. Every student’s story is different on why they joined choir whether it was because they thought it was a easy a, or because they had a open period or just because they liked choir at the end of the day students learn to love choir, and enjoy it. I learned most of this by interviewing several choir students.