Every year in late April, choirs across Nebraska compete to earn high scores from NSAA judges. Gretna East had three choirs perform at the District Music Contest on April 25: the concert choir, the tenor-bass clef choir and the treble clef choir. All three choirs earned superior rankings, making it the second year in a row that Gretna East choirs have scored 1+’s and received feedback from the three judges.
“DMC gives our students a chance to perform for professional adjudicators and receive feedback from people outside of our usual rehearsal setting,” Choir director Nathaniel Wallace said. “It’s not about winning anything—it’s about growing as musicians and representing our school with excellence. Watching students rise to that challenge and take ownership of their performance is incredibly rewarding.”
Each group earned such high rankings, and the choir’s performances all went smoothly.
“On stage, I felt the energy and the vibes, but it wasn’t until I watched the videos taken of us did I really thought, ‘Oh my god, we sound really good,'” Crister said.
Preparation began back in January for the students, but for choir directors Wallace and Patrick Ribar, their timeline looked a little different.
“Planning actually started back in October. I spent time listening to a variety of pieces and thinking about what would best match each choir’s skill level and strengths,” Wallace said, “Once the music was selected, I mapped out a rough timeline so we’d have enough time to learn the music thoroughly and refine it before contest season.”
Wallace didn’t only have to plan for how and when to teach the music, he also had to overcome the obstacle of the tenor-bass clef choir and the treble clef choir not meeting every day to work on their music. Instead, there were rehearsals set outside of school to help the groups improve.
“It was hard to really visualize, or rather imagine, how the music would sound because the choirs were separated this year,” Sophomore Riley Critser said. “With so few people and some voice parts not existing in my class, I worried about the performance at DMC.”
Although Wallace and Ribar started the process of learning the music, it took lots of work and effort from each student to perfect each note and rhythm.
“The hardest part of DMC preparation was enjoying the process,” Senior Brianna Wozniak said. “Going over the same portion of a song can be gruelling, but the effort we put into each piece paid off in the end.”
