On Thursday January 25, the Antioch Community High School Acapella Choir performed at the Illinois Music Education Association Conference in Peoria, Illinois. For the first time in D117 history, a choir was sent to perform among the top choirs in the state. The Sequoits performed against four other full choirs and multiple smaller-scale groups.

“I knew we had a good chance of making this conference based on the talent in our program, but actually being chosen was awesome,” Choir Director and Fine Arts Department Chair Michael Hickey said. “Our district has talented students and this performance allowed all of the music educators around us to know that fact. My hope is that we will have more groups in all genres of music perform at this conference in the years to come.”

Following IMEA rules, now that ACHS has made it to state, the Sequoits aren’t allowed to send a full choir to the conference again for another four years. Making state for choir is, in a sense, a two year process. Choirs must submit recorded songs to be judged a year before they expect to be invited to perform.

“The group that we had last year and this year, we felt confident enough that we had songs that we prepared well enough to be able to show off to all of the different directors that are willing to come and watch our performance down at state,” senior and acapella choir president Charles Wagner said.

Wagner and his choirmates were thrilled to have been able to perform and are proud to be the first choir ever to be sent from D117

“To be in a choir that goes down to state is one of the highest honors you can get as a full choir,” Wagner said. “I feel honored to be able to have that opportunity, especially in my senior year.”

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Jason Wood