Acapella. Choate acapella. It’s always been a thrill for those of us cheering offstage as the Whimawehs, Liliths, Maiyeros, Bella Cantos, or Kaprophones dazzle the crowd with their charisma and lyrical energy. The week of September 3 marked annual acapella auditions, when students from every form sing their hearts out, hoping to become a part of Choate’s acapella community.
This year, the groups joined forces and held auditions together. Maiyeros President Evan Robison ’16 explains, “This year we’ve done a really good job at working together during auditions. All the female groups did their auditions together and all the male groups did their auditions together. We saved a lot of stress for those auditioning.”
Ibrahima Mbaye ’16, a three-year senior in the Maiyeros, outlines the male audition process in detail: “We start off with a range test, where we play up the octave to see how high or low you can go.” This range test is followed by a test in which returners play different chords to see if the student can identify the three different notes within the chord.
“After the chord test, [the returners] play some really weird sounding chord progressions that the student has to sing to test how comfortable he is with different sounds,” explains Mbaye.
The student then performs his solo. After this, he is challenged with the Scream Test: “We play a note on the piano, and we tell them to memorize that note. We make a ton of noise by banging the drums and screaming. We then ask them to give us back the note the way we gave it to them,” chuckles Mbaye. “It’s probably the hardest test there is.”
During callbacks, the students are taught a song. “After we taught them the song, we asked them to practice it. We then walked around and listened to who was flat. It’s actually kind of funny: we put our ears really close to their mouths and make them a little uncomfortable,” Mbaye laughs. “Then, we make our decisions.”
Maya Iyer ’16, the president of the only coeducational acapella group on campus, the Bella Cantos, explains the negotiating process: “The girls who audition get preferences for what groups they’d like to be in, and we took that into consideration when we made our decisions.”
Robison adds, “We negotiated to make sure so that everything was fair. However, when we couldn’t make a decision on a person, we let him choose between the groups.”
Kay Ingulli ’18, a newly accepted member of the Whimawehs, says, “I’m really excited to be a part of the Whims. We haven’t had too many practices yet because it’s the beginning of the year, but it already feels like I’m a part of a family.”
Jaiveer Khanna ’17, a Kaprophone, says “There was a lot of great talent at auditions and I’m really excited to see how everything turns out. We’ve got a great year ahead of us.”
Iyer remarks on the beauty of joint auditions: “It shows that we’re not separate groups, but we are just a group of people who really love to sing. It’s an acapella community.”
