MISSOULA – Students from Missoula’s three public high schools come together once a year for one fantastic choir performance.
There are some wonderful sounds coming from this year’s Missoula Choir Festival Group.
Students from Sentinel, Hellgate and Big Sky high schools come together each year to put on one fantastic concert, an event that many of these kids look forward to all year.
“I love it, it is just a great way for me to express myself and come together with people who love singing and making music and share that common interest,” said Haven Moss who is a senior at Big Sky.
One of the great things about choir — and specifically this choir — is that it brings people together, no matter what their background may be.
“The best part is just the community of it all. You get to come together with these people who are all focused on the same thing,” said Hellgate senior Monroe Ayers.
“It is just amazing to come together with people you don’t get to see every day and come together with them and sing and perform with them,” added Sentinel senior Skyler Babcock. ” There is such a diverse set of people and it is so cool to get to learn about everyone and everything.
Hellgate High School senior Kathrine Kirgis sang in her first organized choir at eight years old and says that singing has been a big part of her life. It’s also one reason she loves living in Missoula.
“I love to sing, and it is really great because we have so many great opportunities in Missoula to sing,” Kirgis said. “Not only in solo performances, but also choral atmospheres and we just have a lot of choir in this town, it is really great!”
Some of these kids may just sing while in school, while others, — like Ayers — plan to keep it going, even once he graduates.
But it’s more than just the joy of singing that he wants to keep a part of his life, it’s the community it offers as well.
“I don’t just want to go into it for the glam of it all, but for the people are really the best I have met. It is like, this is where I think I belong,” Ayers concluded.
If you would like to hear these wonderful musicians, go check out their holiday performances.
The Hellgate High School choir will perform on December 10 at 7 p.m. in the Dennison Theater on the University of Montana campus. Tickets cost $3.
The Big Sky High School choir performance is set for December 12 beginning at 7 p.m. at Big Sky High School.
The Sentinel High School choir will perform on Dec. 20 at 7:30 p.m. at Sentinel High School.
