MANILA, Philippines – Miriam College High School (MCHS) Glee Club gives us another reason to be proud as Filipinos.

In the recently concluded 2012 World Choir Games, the MCHS Glee Club emerged doubly victorious, conquering two separate open categories in the competition: Musica Sacra and Youth Choirs of Equal Voices categories.         

The World Choir Games is often regarded as the Olympics for singers and choirs. It has been the global confluence of more than 2,000 choirs throughout its more than a decade-long history. This year, the competition was held for the first time in the United States, specifically in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Led and conducted by Nancy C Roman, the 34 members of the chorale group showed their singing prowess in the global arena and brought home two gold diplomas, a trophy and a cash prize.

The competition has two main categories, the open and championship categories. The MCHS glee club participated in only two of the 18 open categories of the competition. In both, it bested 30 chorale groups from across the world.

Sweeter the second time around

The MCHS glee club first joined the largest international chorale competition two years ago, in the 2010 World Choir Games held in Shaoxing, China.

Unfortunately, the first-timer chorale group fell only a few points from bagging the gold diploma.

Learning from their pioneer experience and knowing already what to expect, conductor Roman prepared and geared the glee club for the 2012 competition.  “When we heard the choirs there in China, the bar was really high. So going for the 2012 world choir games, we knew what awards we wanted,” Roman told Rappler.

However, their road to the 2012 competition was not totally smooth-sailing. They had to face a few challenges along the way – like dealing with changes in the composition of the group.

Since the last World Choir games in 2010, the MCHS glee club lost old members and gained new ones. Of course, the changes in number and, more importantly, in the quality of voices meant re-adjusting to how their voices mix altogether. The glee club has 4 voices: Alto 1, Alto 2, Soprano 1, and Soprano 2.

The chorale group also had to get permission to sing the unpublished songs they performed in the competition from the composers. In particular, they had to pay for the right to perform them.

Preparations

Despite these hurdles, the glee club came back to this year’s competition in full force.

Setting their eyes on the prize, the glee club started training as early as 2010.

However, the glee club only started practicing the pieces for the competition this March, translating to a rigorous summer on the part of the members. They would meet 3 hours a day, thrice a week to train.

But it was not difficult on the part of Roman. She never doubted the potential of the 34 girls. “For one thing they are very driven. They know what they want. They are talented, very talented.”

Roman screened the choir members herself. She said they were picked because they all bear the requirements she is looking for — talent, confidence and, the “X-factor.”

The competition

They performed Tomas Luis de Victoria’s Duo Seraphim clamabant, Ro Ogura’s Hotaru Koi (a traditional Japanese song), Bardos Lajos’ Magos a Rutafa (Scherzando) and Augusto Espino Jr.’s Ambo Hato for the Youth Choirs of Equal Voices category. 

On the other hand, their winning performance for the Musica Sacra category consisted of Mark Simmons’ Gloria, Javier Busto’s Salve Regina, Alejandro Consolacion II’s Anima Christa and John August Pamintuan’s Oremus.

During the announcement of winners, Roman and the 34 other girls were humbly praying not to be called first as they announced the results from the lowest ranking to the top performers. 

In fact, they were just happy to be awarded at least one of the 4 gold diplomas that were to be given away for the Youth Choirs of Equal Voices category and of the 6 gold diplomas allotted for the Musica Sacra category.  

In fact, Roman did not realize they were already announced as the category winner until the crowd gave them a standing ovation and she got the chance to verify from the person handing her the diploma that they indeed bagged the top spot.

As gold diploma awardee, the MCHS glee club is already qualified to join the championship category for the 2014 World Choir Games. – Rappler.com