Photograph by Paul Myers
Saratoga High students (left to right) Larry Chou, Jeff Shiozaki, Jessica Chang, Emily Chang and Alex Shiozaki, along with their classmates Matt Allen and Jennifer Lee, made the 2002 California Music Educators Association all-state orchestra.
Saratogans making beautiful music as members of all-state orchestra
By Rebecca Ray
For Saratoga High students who make the California Music Educators Association all-state orchestra, the annual performance is like a convention.
Participants "meet so many people" they wouldn't meet otherwise who play classical music and have similar interests, says sophomore viola player Jessica Chang.
Chang, who plays in the SHS orchestra with about nine other viola players, said she's amazed when she walks into the room at the all-state conference and sees about 20 viola players. The number of string bass players, which is around a dozen, also astonishes her. "I've never seen that many basses standing in a row," she said.
"It's a section of... bass players [who] are all really good, and it's like, 'yeah!'" said SHS junior string bass player Matt Allen, who is used to playing with only three other string bass players in the SHS orchestra.
This year, more than 1,000 students tried out for the all-state orchestra. About 100 of them made it and attended a conference March 14 through 16 in Sacramento. The conference culminated in a concert at Sacramento Convention Center, where the orchestra played Rienzi Overture by Richard Wagner; Medea's Meditation and Dance of Vengeance, op. 23-24, by Samuel Barber; and Finlandia Tondichtung, op. 26, by Jean Sibelius.
Last year, a record number of seven Saratoga High students made the all-state orchestra. This year, the record was matched. Besides Allen and Chang, other Saratoga High students who qualified were freshman Alex Shiozaki, junior Larry Chou and seniors Jennifer Lee and Jeff Shiozaki, who all play violin, and Chang's sister, Emily, a senior cello player. Alex and Jeff Shiozaki are brothers.
To most of the SHS players, attending the all-state conference was a repeat experience. Emily and Jessica Chang, Allen, Lee and Jeff Shiozaki played with the all-state orchestra last year, and Jeff Shiozaki and Emily Chang played the year before.
In 2001, Jeff Shiozaki was concertmaster of the all-state group. Once the students arrive at the conference, they audition for seats, and Shiozaki auditioned the best out of 40 or 50 violins. He has been concertmaster of the SHS orchestra for the past four years, receiving the school's outstanding orchestra member award for the 1999-2000 and 2000-2001 school years.
Last year, Jessica Chang became the first Saratoga High student to qualify for the all-state orchestra as a freshman.
The SHS orchestra as a whole experienced a first on the weekend of Jan. 11-13 when it became the first music group at the school to perform at a conference since the 1970s. The orchestra performed during a session that SHS music director Michael Boitz presented at the CMEA Bay Section conference, where he discussed how to grow and improve an orchestra with students of various ages and experience levels.
In 1998, Boitz's first year as a teacher at Saratoga High School, the orchestra had 12 string players. Now there are 54 players in the string orchestra and 82 string players in the full symphony, which also includes wind and percussion instruments.
Allen, who teaches the three other bass players in the SHS orchestra, is trying to develop a bass program at the school. And it's working, Boitz says. Boitz predicts that one or two more string bass players will join the orchestra next school year.
The orchestra won a gold medal and earned a "unanimous superior" rating, the highest rating possible, at a local CMEA festival last spring. But Boitz says that, to him, it's just "icing on the cake."
"One thing to be proud of is not only the fact that the [all-state] students are good musicians, but also the fact that they're great human beings," Boitz said.
Saratoga, California Since 1955
