Northview — Choir rehearsals at Crossroads Middle School this winter have been about more than sight reading, rhythm, time signatures and pitch.
Along with these music fundamentals, the seventh- and eighth-graders have been learning new languages, cultural traditions, drumming and even dancing.
It’s all in preparation for their February concert, titled “Diversity: The Love of Language and Cultures.” The show takes place this Tuesday, Feb. 17, at 7:30 p.m. in the Max Colley Jr. Performing Arts Center, 4451 Hunsberger Ave. NE; tickets are not required.
For vocal music director Tami Hjelm, who has been joyfully directing middle-school music for 32 years, the importance of highlighting diversity through music cannot be overstated.
“I’m Hispanic, we’ve got a great mix of students in (choir), and you can just see that we’re all different,” she said. “Some of us are short, some of us tall … but we’re all human and we’re all in this together. And with the world we’re living in right now, it’s really good for them to get the idea that there’s more than just ‘you’ in this big old world.”
The concert will feature such diverse music as an African American spiritual, a Newfoundland folk song, an Oscar-winning Hindi song with accompanying choreography, and songs in Spanish and German. The audience will also hear a rendition of “O Canada,” which students learned in preparation for an upcoming performance at a Grand Rapids Griffins game.
For seventh-grader Miles Cleveland, the experience of singing in a different language “makes me feel like I’m one with other people who have that specific culture as part of their life.”
That doesn’t mean it’s been an easy process, though.
“It was difficult learning how to pronounce everything and singing words that you don’t really know,” he said. “But I still enjoyed it a lot. I feel like it was something good for us to learn.”
To tackle the language barrier, students first learned pronunciation before moving on to melody and harmony.
“Our teacher was really good at helping us with the words first, pronouncing them and us repeating, so we got the rhythm of everything,” seventh-grader Sara Yonkers said of learning the Spanish folk song, “De Colores.”
“Since (Spanish) is not my first language, it definitely takes a lot of work to learn and put it together,” she said. “My favorite part (of choir) is probably making the mistakes at the beginning, because mistakes help us learn and everyone takes it really well. … (Hjelm) really pushes us, but I like that because it’s worth it.”
Sara noted that an English-speaking song in their repertoire, which is one of her favorites, complements the concert’s theme of diversity well.
“We sing the song, “How Can I Keep From Singing,” which is about the joy that singing brings us,” Sara said. “It’s not necessarily a different language, but it’s about how singing can be its own language.”
At Crossroads, choir is a voluntary but popular class: Hjelm has 83 students in eighth-grade choir and 94 in seventh-grade choir. This year, for the first time, seventh grade has been split into a boys choir and girls choir, but the two come together for a few pieces as well. Each ensemble will be featured in Tuesday’s concert.
While each student has their own reason for wanting to be in choir, Hjelm said she loves watching them build a sense of accomplishment, whether it’s tackling a tricky sight-reading piece or nailing the harmony. It’s one of many reasons why the diversity concert is so special, she said.
“Whenever we start something, they’re always like, ‘We have to learn German?’ … And I just let them complain,” the director said. “And three days later, they’re going, ‘Can we do that German piece?’ They’re hearing all the harmonies as they put it all together. It becomes their favorite thing and that’s the best part.
“I’m getting chills just thinking about it … It’s a gift for them to be able to do this stuff at such a young age.”
Read more from Northview:
• Middle-schoolers showcase talents, find belonging in theater
• Young music pro on track to bring the beats
