String orchestras and concert bands from around the Santa Clarita Valley and Southern California will participate in the Southern California School Band & Orchestra Association concert festival hosted by West Ranch High School on Tuesday, March 26 and Wednesday, March 27, 10 a.m.-9:30 p.m.

Bands and orchestras from the seven Santa Clarita Valley public high schools (Canyon, Hart, Saugus, Golden Valley, Castaic, Valencia and West Ranch) as well as SCV middle school bands from Sierra Vista, Placerita, La Mesa, Arroyo Seco, Castaic and Rancho Pico, will take part in the festival.

Other schools scheduled to attend include Beverly Hills High School, Hollywood High School, Redondo Union High School and Thousand Oaks High School.

The two-day festival offers an opportunity for student musicians to demonstrate their skills and talent for a panel of adjudicators, both in a performance setting, as well as in sight-reading. There will be three adjudicators in the performance venue, and one in the sight-reading room.

Students receive four minutes to study a new piece of music before they must perform it. At the conclusion of the sight-reading performance, adjudicators will spend a few minutes with the students to give feedback on how well they executed the piece.

Rod Schueller, director of instrumental music at West Ranch High School, said getting the chance to be evaluated by professional adjudicators provides student musicians with the opportunity to hear from an outside source what they need to improve their performance.

“Although we as directors/conductors have likely voiced those same criticisms that students receive from the adjudicators, it is good for them to hear those comments from someone with an outside perspective,” Schueller said. “I would say that there are times when you hear a critique as a director and think, ‘How in the world did I miss that?’ Sometimes adjudicators will offer a solution to an issue you’re having in an ensemble, and you can use it moving forward.”

The festival is a prestigious event for the West Ranch High School music program and it is nice for the West Ranch students that schools from around the area can come to our campus, Schueller said.

“It is prestigious for West Ranch to be asked to host an SCSBOA event,” he said.

West Ranch High School

26255 Valencia Blvd.,

Stevenson Ranch, CA 91381

For more information, call (661) 222-1220, ext. 646.