Freshman voices on advanced orchestra and how their experience has been with it so far. What do they find difficult? What do they like about it? Any upcoming events?
By: Ashley B. Acevedo and Anamarie Lopez
Our RHS Advanced Orchestra contains many hard-working and talented musical students.
Anastasia Mikhael, ‘28, talks about her experience with Advanced Orchestra so far as a freshman. Mikhael plays the cello, her reasoning as to why she plays the cello is because of her fourth-grade teacher.
She says, “My fourth-grade teacher, she inspired me because I really liked her, so I wanted to do orchestra because she was also the orchestra teacher. I also just wanted a bigger instrument, because I thought it’d be really cool.”
Photo A.Acevedo/Gigantea
Mikael also said, “It feels pretty good, I’m proud of myself,” in response to how she feels being a freshman in advanced orchestra.
One of the things Mikael likes about it is getting to play fun music, and it’s a bit more of a challenge for her. One thing she finds difficult is the music being more advanced, and since there are a lot of cellos, it makes things more competitive.
Zoey Lovgren, ‘28, is also a cello player. Her inspiration is, “My family, they’re very into music, and my sister plays the violin so my parents encouraged me to play an instrument too, so I chose the cello.”
As for her feelings as a freshman in Advanced Orchestra, Lovgren said, “In the Chamber group, there [are] not many freshmen. I believe there [are] four freshmen, so I feel very, very young compared to the others, not as talented as they are, or as advanced. But it feels nice being in a good team with a lot of people that are very talented, hard-working individuals.”
Lovgren likes Advanced Orchestra because of the music. She says, “Music in general is just so fun. I love going to concerts, I love dressing up, I love performing. And I feel like the overall atmosphere of orchestra students feels very welcoming, [it] feels like something that I’m part of.”
One thing Lovgren finds difficult is the fact there are only four instruments and it can get competitive, especially with the violins.
Lovgren also says, “If you go to certain auditions for certain orchestra groups, like the state orchestra, it’s very difficult to get in because there’s so many kids from the Bay Area, who have a lot of money, and they have a lot of connections, so it’s a gateway for them to become really good. But overall, I think that’s definitely the hardest part, competition. But everything else is great.”
Sierra Carlson, ‘28, says that she looks up to her older sister. Carlson said, “A lot of my friends have been in orchestra, and my sister was in orchestra and I look up to her a lot. I absolutely love playing viola.”
Carlson says she’s done many concerts in her life, and she loves to go to concerts with her friends and family.
Colin Wyman, ‘28, talked about things revolving around him and orchestra. He talked about how he plays the cello and what inspires him to play it, that being because he likes how it sounds.
Photo A.Acevedo/Gigantea
He has gone to and has performed in concerts before, his first performance having been in sixth grade.
Wyman said, “I like the instrument, It’s a big instrument and it’s hard to play.”
Grace Yang, ‘28, plays the violin. She’s inspired to play the violin because it was a big dream of hers. Yang said, “It’s just been a really long dream of mine since I was really little.”
Yang has also performed in concerts since she was in fifth grade but only started to take lessons when she was in seventh grade, and she also has done many things outside of school.
Yang said there would be an upcoming show/concert on October 29th at the L.J. Williams Theater.
Yang talks about the instrument she plays, and she goes on to say, “I really like it, violins usually have the melody in the song, so it’s fun.”
Anamarie Maciel-Lopez
Ashley Acevedo
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