Brownsville Veterans Memorial tenor-bass choir to perform in San Antonio
Jan. 25—Only have a minute? Listen instead
The Veterans Memorial Early College High School Varsity Tenor-Bass Choir is putting the final touches on an invited performance at the 2024 Texas Music Educators convention set for Feb. 9 in San Antonio.
Twenty-one sophomore, junior and senior boys at VMECHS comprise the choir, directed by Travis Baldwin and accompanied by pianist Uzziel Guzman, a Brownsville Independent School District accompanist. They are one of only two varsity tenor-bass choirs in all of Texas invited to perform at this year's TMEA convention.
The group will give a free pre-TMEA convention concert Feb. 1 in the Veterans Memorial auditorium in Brownsville. Their TMEA performance is scheduled Feb. 8 in the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio.
The students have been practicing the music since July, which is a series of seven songs that Baldwin chose from different time periods and in different styles to showcase the boys' singing range, style and talent.
Some of the songs reflect what's going on in the world today, Baldwin said when asked, noting that one is from a set of three Polish war songs and another is in Hebrew, reflecting the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war near Poland and Israel's war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
TMEA selected the choir based on more than 180 submissions from across Texas for six invited choir slots, two of which were for tenor-bass choirs. Baldwin submitted recordings of the varsity tenor-bass choirs from the last two school years, and a TMEA committee made selections based on those recordings.
"It has been an incredible journey. It's been a 13-year goal for me to get a group, to be invited and to have finally have gotten that, taking this journey with the guys has been really special," Baldwin said. "It definitely has been a challenge and to push them to be their absolute best that they can be for the performances takes a lot of tenacity from them and from me. It takes a village."
Iliana Guererro, the assistant choir director, conducts one of the songs. Harlingen High School accompanist Ruben Reyes arranged the closing song "La Blikina."
Choir members include sophomores Adrian Alfaro, Austin Arguelles, Eugenio Cardenas, and Ruben Rosas; juniors James Ayala, Antonio Lambert, Emmanuel Limas, Dean McElyea, Luis Perales, Daniel Ramirez, Sergio Sosa, Joel Trevino and Jesus Urbina; and seniors Ramundo Benavides III, Jorge De Los Santos, Adrian Escobar, Joshua Gault, Hector Montoya, Manuel Obregon, Andres Ramirez and Cesar Ramirez.
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Editor's note: This story has been updated to correct the day of the performance and the name of the assistant choir director.
