After a month of preparation, we filmed audition videos with Wheaton College’s Concert Choir in September and were selected as two of nine semifinalists invited to the American Choral Directors Association’s student conducting competition out of over 200 applicants.

In Salt Lake City this February, our challenge was to improve a collegiate choir’s sound through our interpretation of two pieces during an eight-minute rehearsal. This requires not only a clear vision, but instant trust and rapport with the ensemble. 

Our goal, then, wasn’t so much to do it “right” as to love the choir we were working with and to show love for the music through gestures and words—a goal born of our shared education at Wheaton.

During the ACDA National Conference, we spent time with Dr. John Trotter, assistant professor of choral music and director of Wheaton’s Concert Choir; Dr. Mary Hopper ’73, professor of choral music and conducting, director of Wheaton’s Women’s Chorale and Men’s Glee Club, and ACDA president; Dr. Jerry Blackstone ’74; Dr. John Nelson ’63; and more.

We are grateful for our classmates and professors here at Wheaton who have shaped us as musicians and as persons, and made it possible for us to be part of this competition. It’s cliché, but we would not be who we are today without them.