STRIKING GOLD
PG students bring home UIL medals in music theory
The sweet sounds of success filled the band hall at Pleasant Grove High School last month when Band Director Mark Windham opened an unexpected envelope from the University Interscholastic League.
“You should have seen me,” he said. “I was jumping up and down and yelling out loud.”
His exclamations were in response to the two gold medals he held in his hands, which were earned in the music theory category by Anna Yowell and Bryceson Laing. They, along with nine other music students at PG, competed in the state UIL competition in May.
They had made it through regionals in the solo and ensemble categories, and the band directors realized the music theory test was being given while they were in Austin competing at the state level. The directors signed them up to compete, the first time the school had entered the category. The tests were then graded over the next few weeks, with UIL notifying the winning schools by mail.
Don Colquitt is the advanced placement music theory teacher at PG. Although he’s the band director at the middle school, he made daily trips to the high school last year to teach the intricacies, science and art of music in all its forms to juniors and seniors.
“It’s really cool because I’m like their first teacher. I set them up the very first day, and this is like the other end of the spectrum,” he said of Anna and Bryceson’s wins.
He added that the class is very intense, which prepared the students well for the UIL competition.
“It’s really very difficult,” he said. “They say it’s one of the harder exams to take. Besides understanding harmony and rhythm … it’s not music theory. It’s literacy. It’s understanding the workings and the scientific end of music—the mechanical, engineering end of music.”
Anna, who will be a senior this year, said the award was a huge surprise for her.
“I did not expect to get an award of this magnitude,” she said. “It means all my hard work this year has really paid off, and I’ve been working towards a goal all this year that I didn’t even know I was working towards.”
Her music career began in the sixth grade when she signed up for beginner band at PG Middle School. Now, she’s captain of the color guard, plays the flute and piccolo and said she plans to continue her music career at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.
Bryceson, who graduated in May, has played the piano since age 5. An accomplished percussionist, he also studied with renowned Texarkana pianist Mary Scott Goode. He plans to study engineering at Texas A&M University-College Station in the fall.
Colquitt said he’s very proud of the students, as they’ve achieved a rite of passage pretty much by simply passing the class. He added that Anna and Bryceson also had perfect scores on their Advanced Placement exam.
“It’s a hard class. We try to make it the hardest class these kids have ever had and the one they enjoy the most,” he said. “I’m really lucky to be teaching such smart kids. It’s a really rare thing, and I told the kids, ‘You have set an impossible mark for the others.’ They’re just smart. It makes it easy.”