Greenhill Chamber Orchestra and Greenhill Singers had their spring concerts on Apr. 10 and Apr. 11, respectively.

The Greenhill Chamber Orchestra successfully performed their prepared pieces during their concert and at the Independent Schools Association of the Southwest (ISAS) preview.

The orchestra played two movements from “Water Music” by George Frideric Handel. Water Music” has three suites, and the orchestra performed two in G major.

The third piece was “Brandenburg Concertos No. 3” by Johann Sebastian Bach, and the orchestra finished with A-roving by John Rutter, based on a British folk song.

“It’s a very nice orchestral arrangement that is the opening movement from his suite for strings,” said Middle and Upper School Orchestra and Strings Director Nick Paraskevas.

However, the planning around rehearsals and practices was for Paraskevas and the Orchestra, as the orchestra ran into problems regarding students’ schedules.

“The biggest challenge is certainly just that all [students] are so busy doing a lot of things,” Paraskevas said.

With many students’ various activities around campus, getting students together for rehearsal created the same challenge for Paraskevas.

“Rehearsal becomes really challenging at times because we have breaks in the schedule, we miss days because of whether people are out for this or that activity, as you know, that’s why you go to a school like this because you can do a lot of different things,” said Paraskevas.

Freshman Kendall Johnson participates in the orchestra, varsity girls volleyball and is also the freshman class vice president.

“Balancing orchestra, student council and both school and club volleyball can be tricky at times, especially during the spring when there are more sinfonia recitals,” Johnson said.

The Greenhill singers also performed at ISAS, along with having a concert earlier in the week.

At the concert on April 11, the choir performed many pop songs, which is a different mood when compared to the Greenhill holiday sing-along in December 2022.

The singers sang “Unclouded Day,” “Set Me As a Seal,” “Sing to Me” and “I Dream a World” along with Dance Company and Middle School Dance Ensemble for two of the songs, “Grand Piano” and “Falling For Ya.”

Freshmen Jin Huang and Avery Montoya, along with seniors Khushi Chhaya, Laya Venkat and Daniel Smith, all had solos during the concert.

“For ISAS, we had a slightly different set list because we are not allowed to do solo pieces for the choir concert – that’s a different event at ISAS,” Greenhill Singers conductor and Director of Middle school and Upper school choir Lucik Aprahamian said.

The choir previously had faculty pianist Jonathan Gregoire, and drummer, Christian Dorn on stage with them, but they did not travel to ISAS with them.

“We also didn’t have our drummer or the dancers, and we were in a chapel, so it was a more formal setting,” Aprahamian said.

In preparation for the concert, the choir practiced with all the pieces of their performance. This enabled Aprahamian and other collaborators to see what they needed to adjust.

“When we add dancers and percussion, then we have to have extra rehearsals and figure out timing, placements on stage, and tech in a different way. It all becomes like a dance we all perform on stage.” Aprahamian said.

“I think [Aprahamian] did a good job leading us, like rehearsing the songs and performing, we’re a ten-person choir so like it’s kind of different from other choirs,” said Huang.