Music is an art that can bring all walks of life together. On Thursday, December 17, the music department did just that. For the first time in nine years, the ERHS music department had band, orchestra, and choir perform under one roof for a spectacular performance. Four bands, two choirs, and two orchestras came together to perform classic holiday tunes to welcome the holiday season, such as Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You,” Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake,” and Pentatonix’s cover of “White Winter Hymnal.”

The return of the music department’s biggest collaboration was for the parents as much as it was for the students. Orchestra director Dr. David Yarbrough explained that students and parents should “be able to see what the other departments are doing.” His two performing orchestras, Chamber and Symphony Orchestra, were merged into one ensemble to play pieces that “were already prepared,” he recalls. The orchestra department had its winter concert in November, so Dr. Yarbrough had the Chamber and Symphony Orchestras “repeat a part of the program that was already done.”

This concert was also an excellent experience for the music department’s newest additions: Mr. Cullen Waller of the band department and Ms. Aubree Salters of the choir department. As the new band director, Mr. Waller loved “how the departments were willing to work together and come back together” to showcase all the different ensembles in one evening. His “percussion class, concert band, symphonic band, and wind ensemble” were split up into two ensembles so his students could have an opportunity to “play with students they normally wouldn’t have the chance to play with.” Ms. Salters, the new choir director, was proud of how hard her students worked. She stated that many of her students in her performing ensembles—Gospel Choir and Concert Choir—“performed on stage for the first time in many years” that night due to the COVID-19 pandemic, so she was glad they showed her and themselves “what they’re capable of doing.”

Despite the debate of which Fine Arts department is superior, all the students from the performing ensembles worked efficiently and productively to bring the ERHS community a memorable experience that will hopefully return to becoming a yearly tradition as it was nine years ago.