The first Open Mic Night was held in the school cafeteria Feb. 5., with around 30 participating groups including various musical acts, a poem reading, an impromptu joke session and a surprise ending dance number.
Forty-seven concert choir students will be traveling on a group trip to San Francisco April 19 to 21. The Open Mic Night was held to raise money for the trip.
All students were allowed to perform.
Senior Sierra Ducatt was in charge of organizing the event after coming up with the idea.
She heard about an event similar at Rogers High School called Beatnik Night from a friend that attends the school.
“I thought that this would be a perfect opportunity to get more people out musically,” Ducatt said.
A large portion of audience members stayed throughout the whole night.
“I think the folks were really happy with it,” choir teacher George Guenther said.
Senior Amanda Kohler was one of the performers of Open Mic Night and will be going on the trip.
“It’s really nice to see peers from our school that aren’t in choir that come here to support us and to hear us. It kind of shows that we are more than just a class,” Kohler said.
Although there isn’t a certain event that choir is attending in San Francisco, there is a plan for the trip.
“We are designing our own tour, so we are going to go to Stanford University, work with the professor of music there, sing at Grace Cathedral,” Guenther said. “We are going to sing at the University of San Francisco, we are going to sing at a church in Marin County in Tiburon, there’s an old historic church that overlooks the Golden Gate Bridge and the bay and the ocean.”
There may be another Open Mic Night in the future.
“We will probably do another one towards the end of the year,” Ducatt said.
By the end of the night, there were few seats left.
“Once 6 p.m. hit, so many people were there. I was definitely not prepared for that many people to show up and I’m glad so many people ─ since it was such a long event ─ stayed throughout the whole thing and saw the really awesome ending acts,” Ducatt said.
