All-island Inter-school CHOIR COMPETITION

The Choral Director behind the Winning Team

There was one thing I saw in the girls, and it was their dedication and application to the work

Life Online recently got the chance to sit down with the recently appointed choral director of Visakha Vidyalaya, Rohan De Lanerolle, and talk about their recent accomplishments at the All-island Inter-school Choir Competition.

Q WHY VISAKHA?

I got this job by default, upon Vinodh Senadeera’s passing. It was an unfortunate situation, but I was willing to take over for him.

Q WHAT WERE YOUR FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF THE CHOIR WHEN TAKING OVER AS DIRECTOR?

In fact, the girls asked me the same thing after we won the competition. They were better than I expected. My expectations were relatively low, but what I heard was something different, definitely better than what I expected, however, not up to a point where I would want to get it to. I had to work on tonal change, enunciation etc. Once we started working, my expectations were really high, and in a good way since it would enable us to push the standard. We never started working towards competing, and we were looking forward to our concert. Suddenly, this circular comes along where it turns out we are indeed competing. I needed some time to think about this, since it was only a month into taking over the choir as their director.

I thought about it, and there was one thing I saw in the girls, and it was their dedication and application to the work. If I ever told them something to do, they would pick it up incredibly fast and were quick on the uptake. So, I thought if I added a little pressure, I could get these girls working for our end goal, which was to just get into the finals.

Q CAN YOU TELL ME A LITTLE ABOUT THE STRUCTURE OF THE COMPETITION?

Visakha Vidyalaya won after a span of 6 years having competed before in the A1 equal voices’ category.

The A1 Category is where the choir has help from outside the school system. I think the categories are fair, because the level of competition differs between the schools receiving outside help versus the schools working on their own.

The categories are broken down to gender-based choirs, with each category being divided once again depending on the type of training the choir is receiving in order to have a balanced competition.

Q WHAT IS THE SCOPE OF THIS COMPETITION?

The competition is divided under zonal, provincial and all-island. So, when you consider the western province on its own, there are a considerable amount of schools competing. Quite the challenge.

Even though it is indeed a competition organised by the

Ministry of Education, all schools are allowed. So, we had choirs like St. Lawrence’s who have been there a long time. When we got into the provincials, we had quite a few schools. You don’t know which school is which due to the anonymity carried out within the competition. All schools are in black and white, and also assigned numbers instead of going by name. There were schools like Ave Maria (who were brilliant in their own way), Sujatha, Devi Balika etc.

Q WHAT IS THE KIND OF COMPETITION OUTSIDE OF THE WESTERN PROVINCE?

There are quite a few choirs from the northern, central, and southern provinces, which I noticed.

Q WHAT IS THE SELECTION PROCESS?

Normally, it is the 1st Place at provincial that goes into the all-island. At least, that is how I thought it worked until I realised much later, it is in fact the top 3 schools that move into the all-island. There definitely was good competition. hillwood, Kandy, along with Sacred Heart Convent, Galle, were very notable performances for me.

Q HOW DID YOU SELECT THE MUSIC FOR THE COMPETITION?

There is a set piece for all schools so there was no changing that, but also there was a choice piece. We decided to sing “Seasons of Love” from the famous Broadway musical “RENT”. I decided to sing it acapella since all the other schools had an accompaniment, and it would give us an advantage over the other choirs should we hit the precise notes.

Q HOW WERE THE FINALS IN COMPARISON TO THE PROVINCIALS?

It was tough. Great competition. The judges were the same as the provincials so they could see any improvements.

Q HOW LONG DID YOU HAVE TO PREPARE FOR THE COMPETITION?

Little less than 2 months. Since the girls were busy with extra curriculars after school, I decided to have the practices at 6 30 in the morning. It was amazing to find out that the girls were ready and warmed up, waiting for me to come in. Out of the 54 girls in the choir I selected 19 girls, and by the time the competition came around, the 19 had come down to 16. This was a task, since it was 16 girls against the 35 member choirs of all the other schools.

Q WHAT PLANS FOR THE CHOIR IN THE NEAR FUTURE?

We are working on something big, yes. Hopefully work towards an international competition.

Q WHAT WAS THE WINNING DIFFERENCE?

It was very close. Very close. We went into the competition not expecting to win, but just getting into the finals.

Q HOW DO THE GIRLS FEEL AFTER THE WIN?

Over the moon. We actually got the news on the way back home, and it was all celebrations in the bus ride back.

Q HOW DID YOU FEEL AFTER COMPETITION?

I was overjoyed, and it happened when we got into the finals. Anything more was just an added bonus.