Seniors opt out of Solo and Ensemble

Putting down her flute, senior Piper Honaker sighed as she realized the inevitable. Despite practicing for hours this month, she knew she would have to call her accompanist and cancel her rehearsals. She would not be attending Solo and Ensemble during her last year of high school.

“There’s just not enough time,” Honaker said. “Senior year is so busy, and my solo was “Canzonetta” by Tcahikovsky, which is really hard. But I wanted to challenge myself.”

Second semester consists of numerous activities and due dates for seniors, including Senior Project completion, turning in volunteer hours and leadership forms, and finalizing college decisions.

In fact, only two seniors will performing solos at the Brevard County Solo and Ensemble on Friday and Saturday: Kevin Barr and Emma Robinson

“I picked my solo in December, but I didn’t start practicing until January,” Honaker said. “Now I just have too much going on to perform it well with my accompanist.”

Other accomplished senior musicians opted not to sign up for Solo and Ensemble.

“I knew I wouldn’t practice a solo at home,” senior Kaycie Scolari said. “I’m not going to play [trumpet] in college either, so it didn’t benefit my time.”

While Scolari said she would like more time in class to practice her instrument individually, the music department needs to use class time preparing for the Music Performance Assessment coming up in March.

“I didn’t want to have the ‘Did Not Attend’ next to my name,” Scalari said. 

Senior Evan Courtney, who is planning on majoring in music in college, is also not playing a solo because he is more focused on college auditions. He has an audition at Boston University this weekend.

Seniors, and students from any other grade, who do participate at Solo and Ensemble will receive comments from a music judge, a score or overall rating of their performance, and potentially a medallion of music honor.

By Emma Robinson