emmaherold

The Nebraska Music Educators Association (NMEA) is a non-profit organization of music educators founded in 1937. The NMEA provides its members and member students with countless musical opportunities. The annual All-State Conference and Clinic held in November is among those opportunities.

All-State instrumental auditions began on Sept. 21 and vocal auditions began on Oct. 7; however there was something different about the audition process this year.

While in the past, participants were allowed to submit a pre-recorded audition, this year they were only allowed one attempt with a live audio recording.

“I was a little more nervous because I knew that if I messed up, I wouldn’t get another shot, I would just have to keep going. I had to work really hard to stay calm and keep my nerves under control,” junior Megan Doehner said.

Auditions were open to NMEA members and their students who paid the $20 audition fee, along with purchasing the Choral ($14) or Jazz Band ($5) audition rehearsal recordings.

Marian choir and band students auditioned at Marian.

Despite this new intense audition process, six students in Select Women’s Choir and nine students in band tried out for All-State. On Oct. 19, the results were announced. From choir, Soprano I Megan Doehner made All-State. Grace Mortenson made it to play clarinet and Katie Williams was an alternate for tuba.

All-State took place Nov. 16-18,  in  downtown Lincoln, Neb. on the UNL campus.

The chorus rehearsed in Kimball Hall, which is connected to The Lied Center. “The first two days are pretty much dedicated to rehearsing. Every day I had hours of vocal rehearsals with the other 440 members of the choir. We went over our pieces and worked on them together. It really is incredible when you have 440 individuals together who all love music— we truly can create some beautiful things,” Doehner said.