Out of the nine districts in Illinois, ten students from Sterling High School qualified for ILMEA. Those students were junior Jace Ankney in band, senior Jacob Brown in band, sophomore Jacob Marruffo in all-state chorus, junior Cory McGowan in honors chorus, senior Henry Oberg in honors chorus, senior Mitchell Prevo in honors chorus, junior Cole Stumpenhorst in honors chorus, sophomore Morelia Vargas in honors chorus, and junior Riliegh Wren in band.
ILMEA is a group of the best musicians from around the state that all perform together.
Vargas says, “It is a wonderful thing to go to, and perform at. For choir districts and all state, you meet tons of different people with different backgrounds and it’s great.”
ILMEA is not easy to qualify for. Making the cut for ILMEA is a big deal, and to make it to ILMEA there are many tasks you need to do. The qualifers have to submit a series of recorded auditions consisting of etudes/pieces. Once the judges listen to the submissions, they judge the piece in order to decide if the students are in the proper position in their ensembles.
Junior Riliegh Wren went to ILMEA for band. Wren spent the whole summer practicing and working towards her goal of making it to ILMEA.
Wren said, “With all of the stress and hard work that went into these auditions, I ended up making district and qualifying for state for the first time and it truly felt amazing considering all of the difficulties that surrounded this task.”
Choir teacher Weston Henry and band teacher Erik Oberg have been a big part of this process as well as the ILMEA qualifiers. They support everyone and help them stay in a positive mindset.
ILMEA performances are over, but performances are not over, with All-State and Chorus concerts coming up in January. These performances are where the best musicians selected from the district auditions come together from all over Illinois to perform in one final concert. With the first concerts going well, we are all excited to see how the All-State and Chorus qualifiers perform in January.
