Granada’s Music Program captures many different era’s of music but none has the variety like our Orchestra does. Granada’s Orchestra led by George Pascoe, plays through all the eras of music, and bring many different sounds of music for us to our hear.

An Orchestra is composed of different instruments like the Violin, the Viola, the Cello, and the Bass but this year they’ve introduced Trombone, a traditional brass instrument, into their ensemble. The Violin plays the higher register and maintains the melody, while the Viola has a mixed part being able to play many different parts. The Cello provides some melody but maintains the lower register’s harmony and the Bass produces low tones that could be rhythmic or long.

This Trimester, our Orchestra has a variety of music from all the different eras starting from 1760 with Joseph Hyden’s Cello Concerto in C Major, skipping ahead to 1948 with Danzas De Panama arranged by Will Grant Smith, then came Kashmir arranged by Tim McCarrick, and then Scheherazade and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot arranged by Carrie Lane Gruselle.

There are many people in Orchestra that lead our Orchestra besides Mr. Pascoe like our Concert Master, Ara Salari, who describes her job as being very important saying,”My job as concert master is important because I need to lead and know everyone and gather everyone to collectively play together and not to get jumbled up. Our diverse yet together together community is what I love about Orchestra because we all play together and we connect with Band and Orchestra through being able to create and play music together and be a great community as a whole. We’re a very open group and we’d always love to have someone new join and we aren’t going to attack you at all. the music is great and I’m proud to be in orchestra as long as I’ve been and love this program so much.”

Within the ensemble there are section leaders, like The Viola Section leader Victor Schwartz, The Cello Section leader Kelsey Hertz, and the Bass Section Leaders Sepp van Waes and Sue Park.

Kelsey Hertz, the Cello Section leader says that,”Being a section leader is more than a title, it’s a leadership position and most people don’t realize that. The responsibility’s of being a section leader can vary but my job is to queue the lower strings and my own solos. Even with these responsibilities, I find orchestra as a relaxing part of my school day, and I’m super into music, the arts, and dancing as a whole and I always make sure I have time for it in my day and I’m just grateful for what I’ve been offered for experiences in our orchestra.”

Likewise, Victor Schwartz, the Viola Section leader, says,”Anyone can join orchestra regardless of musical experience or if they simply don’t have an instrument because we can supply some instruments and learn together as a group,” and Victor also expresses his feelings for the Viola saying,”I love the middle voice of the orchestra and have a mix of melodies, counter-melodies, and harmonies, but what I especially love is getting together as a group and blending all our sounds together to create a wonderful ensemble.”

Many others in orchestra find the program amazing and love everything about orchestra.

Daniel Booth, a freshman Bass and Trombone player, says that,”I wanted to play more music in my high school experience and wanted to do Band but due to scheduling it didn’t really work out so I chose Orchestra and even if you think you won’t have time for it, you can always make it positive. I decided to pick up Bass because I didn’t want to just play on my own and everyone is very supportive of learning instruments so I had the urge to pick up bass. I recommend that that if you get the opportunity to take any music class, you should as the community and the atmosphere is always different within every different ensemble and it’s just an all around great time.”

“I love playing in an orchestra because of the community feel and just creating one common sound that makes everything feel lighter,” says Mulan Sotoodeh, a senior Cello Player,”My favorite piece is Cello Concerto in C Major because of the wonderful feelings and Kelsey’s amazing solo, to which I’ve always looked up to Kelsey as person and a player for her solos, her kindness, and just being my stand partner. Overall in orchestra however, the thing I love most is the variety of music that Pascoe chooses because we playing music from different eras like Cello Concerto and Game of Thrones theme.

Charlie Hertz, a freshman violin, says”I really like how the sounds combine as a whole orchestra, like in the beginning of the year we all feel disconnected, but as we’ve progressed towards our concerts and just playing in general, we sound amazing and overall the Violins sound fantastic, and I really like the violin because of the high notes, the rhythms, and the melodies,and I just find orchestra as a really fun period  with a great community and a good time for learning a new instrument.”

Overall, the Orchestra has many different flavors and spice to up our School and provide the most variety of any musical program in this school. Granada High School have many different ways of conveying different variety of music, and mainly the Orchestra does it best.