Audrey Koh ‘17 and Hannah Kim ‘20 are currently attending CBDA’s All-State Honor Orchestra in San Jose, California, from Feb. 11-14. Both students are members of Archer’s Upper School Orchestra.

At the conference, Koh will play violin for the high school orchestra, and Kim will play the cello for the junior high school orchestra.

The students worked with Orchestra Director Susan Smith to complete their application process. They both made audition CDs in order to demonstrate their skill levels.

“It took me a couple months to get the materials ready, I recorded it after school and then Ms. Smith took care of sending off the audition CD file,” Koh said.

At the seating auditions in San Jose, Kim and Koh both hope to be placed in higher seats in their respective orchestras.

“We have seating auditions right when we get in so I have to prepare for that, and of course I really want to be first chair,” Kim said.

“In orchestra, there is some competition for higher seats so a goal of mine is to get a high seat,” Koh said.

While in San Jose, both girls want to improve their skills as musicians and meet new people.

“I made a lot of friends and they were all really great musicians. I also improved by getting to [listen] to everyone,” Kim said of  the Southern California Orchestra she attended last year. 

Koh also shares advice to those who may want to apply for the program in the future.

“I suggest looking for the audition materials as soon as they’re out, preparing them earlier is better,” Koh said. “It’s like for everything, practice makes perfect, and it’s definitely a very competitive program so the main reason I got in was from practicing every day. It definitely takes dedication.”

“I’m going to keep practicing to get my goal. I don’t want to miss school for nothing so I hope everything goes well,” Kim said.