BY REGAN MCCROSKEY (’15)

“A Joyful Noise” Isn’t really that joyful. It is just another stressful Christmas concert we have to stand through and use up our voices for.

When you’re in the middle of the row, standing next to a loud soprano while singing tenor, feeling sticky with sweat and the girl behind you keeps hitting your head with her folder, you just want to go home and be done with the song you’ve sang a million times.

“You should feel lucky,” our choir teacher always tell us. “Not every high school gets this amazing opportunity to sing with a professional orchestra.”

And yes, that’s probably true, but think about the schedule of any high school student. Homework, jobs, exams, after school activities, etc. I mean the list is endless. We all know that the holiday concert hits us like a hurricane ever year, oh and don’t forget that many of the choir students are already involved in the Candlelight Walking Tour (which is the night before).

Yes, “A Joyful Noise” is a great opportunity, but is it really worth all that stress and trouble?

We were missing many students at the performance. It isn’t obvious? All you hear during the concert is everyone stressing about the amount of homework they have to do that night.

So some students compromised. They just did their homework while waiting to go onstage. Rude? Maybe. But looking around at all of my poor friends as they stressed about their night (myself included), I realized how overworked many students are.

The point of school is for us to learn, but it’s morphed into something completely different than it used to be. Now school is described with phrases like, “I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t stressed” or “I can’t wait until I graduate.”

It’s not fair to students that they have to resort to doing their homework during concerts that should be fun, but instead, it’s just another thing on our agendas. How are we supposed to enjoy Joyful Noise when there’s a giant test looming over our heads?

So just in case you were wondering why the Symphonic Choir decides to do this concert every year, we really don’t. We all do it for the grade because that’s all school is these days: get the grade and move on.

I think that things like “A Joyful Noise” bring out the real issue of school today: are we doing all these things for our own personal interests? Or this just to get an A?