On February 10th, the all-state High School students, who were selected to attend the State Conference in San Antonio, left their classrooms to start this experience and represent Argyle ISD.
The Director of Instrumental Music of Argyle ISD, Kathy Johnson, said that “everything went very well; our students represented our school, district, and community very well. They all rehearsed about 6 hours a day and then played their concerts on Saturday for the Texas Music Educators.”
All-state student, Benjamin Ronnie, said the trip was fun and relaxing. “We still had a lot of work done and it was great to be able to play with such great musicians.”
Ciara Albanese said that her favorite part was going around the exhibition hall and meeting the directors.
The Saturday concert included choir, band, orchestra and general elementary music and all of the Texas music educators in the state were present.
At the region level Argyle ISD had 48 students that made the region band and then out of those students, 29 qualified for area level. “This was far and above any other school. I think the next school might have had 5 students,” Johnson says.
At the area level these students auditioned against a larger pool of students from a larger area. Out of the 29 students who qualified for area level, 9 made it to the state level. Johnson says that it was still a great accomplishment for Argyle ISD, since the next school was only able to have 3 students qualify for state level in our area.
“It’s a big deal. These kids work for this honor from the summer all the way to auditions, which are in December. Then again, they continue to work for auditions that are in January, in order to get to this point,” Johnson said.
Fabianna Blanco, an intern with the University of North Texas, is handling media relations for the Argyle Independent School District.
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