On April 21, the Green Hope Chorus Voices of Hope (VOH) departed from RDU to travel to Walt Disney World in Florida to compete in the Disney Festival of Music. The trip lasted three full days and included two additional travel days. The VOH students performed at the Festival of Music, made music at the Disney Imagination Campus, and created lifelong memories.
VOH is a chorus ensemble that chorus students audition for. The auditions take place at the beginning of the year and consist of singing the song “Once Upon a Time” and performing a short sight reading. The VOH students practice their music every Wednesday during both halves of lunch and hold themselves accountable for taking extra time to practice at home if they need to. The students of VOH performed the songs “Canticum Novum” by Ivo Antognini and “Will the Circle be Unbroken” arranged by J. David Moore at the Disney Festival of Music. VOH specifically got to go to Disney due to their music literacy skills, blending, and years of choir experience.
Shane Lauver (26’), one of the lucky VOH singers to get to travel and perform at Disney, shared his experience. “We got to participate in Disney’s Imagination Campus, which is a program where you go sight-read and then you are put in a recording studio to record parts of songs from Disney movies, and they edit your voices into the movie,” Lauver said, expressing one of his many fun experiences of the trip. “I think we did amazing! I was super happy with how the performance went, and I was really lucky to have this ensemble that has come together and put in the work during lunch.” Lauver emphasized how proud he is of his entire ensemble for the hard work they put in.
Mr. Allen Botwick, the chorus teacher at Green Hope and director of VOH, is the man who made this whole trip happen. He picked out Disney and helped prepare all of the VOH members for their competition. When asked why he picked the Disney Festival of Music, he said, “They’re sort of known across the country for being highly competitive, and they also offered a clinic inside of the participation of the festival. This one [the festival] was unique because we got to be cliniqued by one of the adjudicators.” He added, “We chose Disney because they offer something called the Imagination Campus workshop. This one was called Soundtrack Studios.” He went on to explain that VOH was able to record themselves making sound effects and singing two different songs from The Lion King in one of the Disney World studios. Then, the studio put their singing over those parts of The Lion King. “So basically now we have this video that looks like The Lion King, but it’s Green Hope chorus singing and making the sounds.”
When asked how he felt his students performed, he said, “Oh, I’m so incredibly proud, proud is an understatement. I felt like, for one of the first times in my whole entire career, that we got on stage, and I just felt like everyone stepped into the music together, and it was almost like an out-of-body experience.” Botwick went on to explain that this was his favorite field trip that he’s ever done and rated the experience a “10 out of 10,” saying, “It was cool to go [to Disney World] for my first time with some of my favorite people.”
The Green Hope Chorus’ VOH performed extraordinarily at the Disney Music Festival. The ensemble started preparing for this trip on March 18 by practicing weekly and additionally practicing individually. The GHHS VOH brought home multiple awards, including Best in Class and Best in Show. Best of all, they gained amazing experiences and made memories that they will never forget!
