By Lily Hill ’17, Contributor

This week I had the pleasure of sitting down with Country Day choir teacher Esther K. Rose to talk with her about why she decided to make our school’s choir a show choir. Mrs. Rose defined a regular choir as a “park and bark,” meaning that students just stand and sing, which can be boring. A show choir incorporates choreography, movement, and dance. Mrs. Rose explained it as a “mini-musical.” Her reasoning for making this switch is to “strengthen the theatre and voice program in this small school.” During choir performances students would tend to lose interest, but making this switch to a show choir ensures that the students stay engaged and interested.

This year’s concerts will be the winter and spring concert like previous years. An added bonus to Country Day’s voice program is that the choir will be singing the National Anthem at the UC basketball game to over 10,000 people. This will be an exciting experience, and a way to let Cincinnati Country Day School’s theatre program shine. Mrs. Rose also told me about her new plans for A Capella club. A Capella will be similar to Pentatonix, the well-known A Capella group and winners of “Sing Off.” A Capella will have more beat-boxing as well. Mrs. Rose wants to plan an A Capella and choir collaboration and have both the choir and A Capella clubs perform for other grades in the Lower and Middle Schools.

This year’s Upper School musical is “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.” Mrs. Rose is excited to introduce Lower Schoolers to the musical by incorporating them into the children’s choir in the show! She says that every child will have a “guardian angel” that will make sure they are ready to go on stage on time, have their costumes, and help them get to know the high schoolers. All in all, it looks like it will be an exciting year for show choir and the musical alike!