Jog, jump, lift, turn, run...in heels... and heavy costumes... under sweltering stage lights... smile... make it look easy... now sing, and don't stop. Dance is one of the most active cardio exercises that a person can take part in and it also requires incredible strength, balance, grace, core activation and stamina. Throw in singing correctly and loudly on top of dancing and you have just entered yourself into a boot camp.
Before show choir season begins and even before show music is taught, show choir students begin choreography rehearsals. Some choirs have 2 week choreography boot camps in the summer. Others, work for 2 long weekends at the beginning of school. Bird show choirs have several, consecutive, 8 hour long choreography rehearsals on saturday from the end of September through around November. During these rehearsals, we do an extensive conditioning warm-up, learn all of the choreography for one or more songs, and repetitively run through and perfect the details of the dance. After my first choreography rehearsal, I remember being so exhausted that my friend and I were in hysterics over simple events. We were simply too exhausted to control our laughter.... not the best situation when you are trying to complete a chemistry scavenger hunt project for Mrs. Raybould. You may think that it really isn't that difficult; that you play sports and it wouldn't even phase you right? Well, do you remember Xavier Miles, Allen Spurlock, and Fazon? They were Bird's star football players a few years ago. They were also members of our mixed show choir Sudden Image. They went into their first choreography rehearsal thinking it would be a walk in the park, and came to school on Monday walking like grandpas. Mrs. Gregory never let them live down the fact that they could go through weeks of football conditioning and be completely fine, but one dance rehearsal made them sore to the point that they were whining like little boys when they stiffly walked into her classroom on Monday and TRIED to sit down like normal people.... You see, if dance were any easier, it would be called football.
Saturday rehearsals are intense. Adding vocals and performance aspects to the mix? That's insane. Running a show full out Just dancing will have every member sweating, gasping for air, and dropping to lay on the stage after the final pose if they give 100%. When you add vocals, it takes 4x the energy and endurance. Now, on top of dancing perfectly, you have to use all the air you need to continue dancing to sing. You do not have time for long, luxurious breaths, but only quick "catch breaths" before you hold a note for sixteen beats, at the end of a song, while doing a complicated follow up that has your quads burning fiercely as you try to pop up from the floor, for the fourth time, on beat, with just as much energy as the first time. Oh and you know when you try to run and sing and your voice shakes up and down with the movement? That can not happen in show choir. No matter what the choreography is, the voices must remain steady. This requires an incredible amount of steady abdominal support. We train this by singing while holding planks, and singing and running, and singing and doing jumping jacks. The same level of volume and energy and precision MUST be maintained throughout the entire 25 minute show set. This is not optional; even when you have back to back shows at a school performance or a concert. Not to mention, typically the highest energy song is usually at the end of the set after 20 minutes of singing and dancing non-stop. The last song has to be 10x what any other song was; you have to leave an impression.
Show choir is a crazy genre of performance and requires far more than glitter and twirling. Blood, sweat, and tears go into it... literally.... and bruises, lots of bruises. So next time you watch a show choir, realize that we are more than just people who can sing and dance; we are athletes.
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