Creswell Middle School Choir, onstage at Gladstone High for the annual Music in the Parks Festival, where they won their division. PHOTO PROVIDED/JENNIFER GARZANELLI
On May 5, the Creswell Middle School Choir made their fourth appearance at the annual Music in the Parks Festival, where they captured first place in the Single A Middle School Treble Choir division, receiving a Superior rating from adjudicators for the first time.
The CMS Choir, directed by Erik Telfer, was also named Overall Choir for Junior High/Middle School. ”We had the overall highest score of all choirs performing – even those not in our category,” Telfer said.
The group competed at Gladstone High School with choirs representing Eckstein Middle School from Seattle; Meridian Creek Middle School from Wilsonville, Oregon; and Rowe Middle School from Milwaukie, Oregon. The Choir performed ”The Climb”; and ”Changes,” which featured solos by Tylyn Bowles (Soprano 2), Addie Garzanelli (Alto) and Gabby Halgren (Soprano 1).
Each song performed by a choir is evaluated for tone quality, intonation, diction and pronunciation, note accuracy and rhythmic precision, and musicality – each on a 1-10 scale where 1 to 5 is Poor, 6 to 6.9 is Fair, 7 to 7.9 is Good, 8 to 8.9 is Excellent and 9 to 10 is Superior.
Scored by Clinician-Adjudicators Margaret Green and Dave Cross – both longtime music educators – the CMS Choir received total scores of 92.5 from one and 92 from the other.
”Margaret Green mentioned in her comments that CMS Choir ought to be very proud of their performance,” Telfer said.
Awards were presented after all performing groups gathered in Portland’s Oaks Park.
”I am really proud of CMS Choir and the hard work that they have put in to perform well,” Telfer said.