Choir presents “A Night at the Grammys”

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Hebron Choir is hosting its annual spring show — “A Night at the Grammys” — in the auditorium on May 20 at 7 p.m. and May 21 at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

“It’s different, we’ve never done anything like this before,” choir director Rachel Forester said. “It gave the students a chance to look at some music that we’ve never sung before in a choir setting, like Ed Sheeran’s ‘Thinking Out Loud.’”

The tracks that will be performed at the show have been chosen from a list of songs that have been nominated for “Song of the Year” at the Grammy Awards.

“I’m excited that we get to do Grammys,” choir president Jessica Harper said. “Knowing that we are doing Grammys, something that is so versatile, you can do some really fun ballads.”

The show will involve a variety of songs ranging from “Hey Jude” by the Beatles to “You Belong With Me” by Taylor Swift.

“I love the theme of this show [because]  it hits a lot of different time periods,” assistant choir director Nathan Ratliff said. “[It goes] all the way back and shows a lot of style diversity and it’s really a nice showcase of musical culture at the times.”

Admission will be $5 per person. The money collected will go toward senior scholarships and extra choir lessons. At the end of the show, the audience will be allowed to go to the cafeteria for dessert.

“The thing I like about it is that it’s a different genre of music,” Harper said. “It’s also wrapping up the year in a really fun way so we get to do all these songs that we hear and don’t get to do much of throughout the year. We get to show how we’ve improved throughout the year in this very fun concert.”

Some choir performances will involve dancing choreographed by students.

“Our spring show is the time where we don’t sing quite [much] classical music,” Forester said. “It’s fun so you got to put some movement with it. I mean it’s hard to stand still when the song is fun.”

During the show there will be senior solos and duets in between choir numbers.

“I’m doing [a senior duet] with my friend, Nina,”  Harper said. “We are doing a song called ‘Love the Way You Lie’ by Rihanna. We really like this song because it’s kind of a little bit more in the sad and slow side so I guess it took both of us out of our comfort zones a little bit.”

The students from the Harmony choir have been preparing for the show since February. They rehearsed two mornings a week at 6:40 a.m. and during block lunch.

“[The show] gives the students a chance to really show off what they worked so hard at,” Ratliff said. “We work a lot on singing and vocal performance. This time for the show we have the choreography [which] adds another element of challenge for them to work through while still singing great.”

Near the end of show, the seniors will sing a song which will remain a mystery until performed. As the final act, all of the choirs will come together and sing “We are the World” by Artists for Haiti.

“Choir is about communicating,” Forester said. “We want to make sure that even though we are having to concentrate on movement that we get across the message of the song.”