Every year, the choir takes a trip out of state to close off a great and successful year, and to reward the hard work of the students. This year, the choir went to New Orleans Louisiana to take a quick visit and enjoy the beautiful sights.

More than 100 students went on this trip and almost all had a wonderful and moving experience there.

“We went for choir obviously, we were having a college visit at Tulane University to visit the choir director there.” Robert Algarin said. “We also went to perform at the french quarter during jazz fest. We sang a lot of Louis Armstrong songs.”

Keeping track of over 100 students can be quite the challenge in a new and unfamiliar place, as well as finding the time to rehearse and practice.

“The students behaved really well.” Caitlin Gasco said. “They stayed with their groups and their assigned chaperones. It was hard to find the time to rehearse but we pulled through and performed at the Outside by the Mississippi River and at the mall.”

The students were there for only four days and so there was very little time to see all the sights, their schedule was extremely busy and hectic.

“While we were there, we went shopping on the French quarter, Royal street, bourbon street, and burgundy street.” Giselle Lozano said. “We explored the downtown area and found music at every corner. Whether it was a man on the sidewalk playing piano, to hula hoopers, tap dancers, and trio jazz bands. We also had the opportunity to explore the beautiful campus of Tulane University, and we got a clinic with the head director of their choir program. We also performed a short set at a large shopping center in the downtown area where we gathered a big crowd.”

The college visit was definitely one of the major highlights of the entire trip. The students got to experience the different levels of college choir and got a fresh set of ears to listen to them sing.

“My favorite part of the entire trip was the college visit.” Gasco said. “I loved watching Dr. Raybon work with our class and really support us and what we did and how we sang. It was extremely relieving and rewarding to hear him affirm and state that we were a good choir.”

Although Austin is known for it’s unique absurdness, in some areas New Orleans puts the city to the test.

“There were these young boys.”Ana Sofia Garza said. “One around my age and the other two looked to be around eight or ten, that were tap dancing but they had made their own tap shoes out of crushed cans on the bottom of their basketball shoes and it was intense, they sounded amazing.”
New Orleans is known for it’s calm aura and its soothing jazz music. This city has kept its soulful culture which is why it remains to this day, as a city for relaxation and enjoyment.

“I enjoyed the love and the different type of environment that we were in.” Algarin said.“The dinner boat cruise was my favorite part, the atmosphere was so peaceful and really enjoyable, the view was breathtaking and the food was so delicious. It wasn’t as structured as school is and people were a lot more relaxed. It was wonderful to have the ability to express our music with a different culture. There were lots of close friendship moments. A true bonding experience.”

Although the trip was overall enjoyable, there were some bumps in the road at the hotel.

“The first night we arrived to New Orleans, we were all in our rooms, getting ready for bed or already asleep.” said Lozano. “It was around 1:30am, and all of a sudden, the hotel alarms go off. They were awfully loud and almost siren like. We all woke up terrified, and had to run down 5 flights of stairs to evacuate the building. Nobody had any idea what was going on, and everyone was yelling screaming. Once we all made it downstairs and outside, the staff told us there was a false alarm accident in the kitchen. Confused, scared, and mad, we were all told to go upstairs and resume our sleep.”

Overall, the trip was fun filled and the students had a good time with their peers and teachers in a new environment.

“This trip was amazing.” said Lozano. “The only thing that I didn’t enjoy was having to drive through storms on the way there, and back. We took a charter bus & used that for transportation, and the weather was not on our side. It was rainy and groggy for the drive there and back. But the weather was beautiful the rest of the days, which rocked.”