The McClintock Choir program put on the 2015 Pops Concert on Tues., Mar. 2 and Wed., Mar. 3 in the Boyle auditorium. The theme this year was “I Gotta Feeling.”
This year, Katie Gerrich and the choir students worked with a new choreographer, Donna Peterson, who brought a new batch of routines for them to perform. All choir classes learned the majority of their music, including a choral union piece, before learning the dances.
“[The time it takes to choreograph a dance] kind of depends on the actual piece of music and also who I’m working with,” Peterson said. “We’ve gotten a lot done in a really short period of time because the kids pick up so fast.”
Some of the songs that choirs and soloists performed were 1960s hits, while others were modern pop tunes that virtually everyone is familiar with.
When choreographing a song, “Sometimes you’ll just go with what the song is already telling you, but sometimes that gets a little boring,” Peterson said. “So you want to try to find a spin on it and maybe try to tell a different story, especially for songs that are played a lot.”
Depending on the song, the choreography could end up being fairly simple, with a series of standard movements, or end up rather complex, with turns, jumps and fast-paced steps.
“I really like the challenge,” freshman Asa Andreas in Men’s Chorale said of learning the dances.
Aside from the added aspect of choreography in Pops, students have fun learning new music.
“I get to sing songs that I really didn’t know existed. I really like You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin,’ because it’s a really catchy tune,” Andreas said.