music
April 17, 2025
Bands battle at Eastern Exposure
Last Friday, Eastern Exposure, a music festival hosted by East Hall, brought cheers and applause among the mosh pits of the chilly night. The set included four hours of student performances, including a battle of the bands that featured Potential Novelty’s last performance, as well as Steel Mugs, new group formed by Anton Alstrom-Brookhyser and Josiah Miller, two first-years. Kate Bodiker, a junior writing and communication double major and East resident shared about the start of the event. “It started with Birch and Bee! The Band playing on a pallet on the other side of East [in 2022]. And then...
April 3, 2025
GC strings studio confronts bad intonation
The Goshen College Music Department invested in April Fools day this year with their Bad Intonation Night. For the second year in a row musicians, singers and chamber choir members joined together for an evening of performances combined with jokes and light hearted humor in the Rieth Recital Hall. Dustin George-Miller, Office Coordinator for the Music Department was in charge of making the evening fun and enjoyable for the audience. George-Miller took center stage in his shirt and tie, accompanied with a rainbow music note suit jacket and running shoes. When asked to describe last year’s April Fools recital he...
February 13, 2025
Dreaming in beats
Along with homework, exams and late night study sessions, Lars Razor, a senior communication major, and Matija Margetic, a junior film production major, find the time to express their creativity through the art of music. Both transform their feelings and experiences into tunes for listeners with similar journeys. Razor’s musical journey began at age 5 as he listened to his grandmother, Lillian Jones, a singer from a gospel music band, The Vocalaires. The gospel group performed across the country, from Michigan to Missouri to California. Although she stopped performing before Razor became a teenager, he vaguely remembers attending his grandmother’s...
November 25, 2024
Lavender Jazz sambas in Sauder
Goshen College’s Lavender Jazz band hit the stage with a show-stopping performance on Friday, Nov. 15, in Sauder Concert Hall. With a set list of six different songs, the band captivated the audience and ended with an encore for their grand finale. Greg Smucker, who has served as the director of Lavender Jazz for the past six years, spoke highly of the group when talking about the decisions that went into choosing the setlist for the concert: “This band is very accomplished, as far as musicians, and so as soon as I knew the band — they were all returning...
November 3, 2024
GC choirs ‘spread hope’ in fall concert
On Saturday, Oct. 26, the Goshen College Music Department held its annual Fall Choral Concert. A tailgate hosted by the Campus Activities Council in the Music Center courtyard was a prelude to the concert itself. The tailgate provided snacks, refreshments and lawn games. Ella McLeod, a junior accounting major and member of the Campus Activities Council, said she wanted to “bring light to students that are going to be performing and … [bridge] the gap between the dorms and residents and the concerts at Sauder.” While the event was advertised to students on campus, the CAC generously opened up the...
October 10, 2024
Students learn together in new United Sound course
“Music with United Sound” is a new 16-week, three-credit course in collaboration with Elkhart High School, and allows Goshen College students to learn a string instrument alongside high school students with disabilities. The course is a part of the nationwide United Sound Program. Within the college, the program is run by Hillary Harder, Community School of the Arts director and GC chapter leader, alongside Tracy Weirich, special education teacher and Elkhart High School chapter leader. It offers high school students a college-level experience. United Sound said, “Our mission is to remove barriers and foster social change through music.” In the...
October 4, 2024
Cultivating Hispanic heritage through music
On Saturday, Sept. 14, Goshen held its fourth annual Hispanic Heritage Festival. The event was created for the purpose of educating our broader community about Hispanic Heritage Month and to enjoy dancing, food and music, but most importantly, to celebrate and embrace these beautiful cultures that make up our community-wide family. Not only were there over 80 vendors present but there was something particularly special on the stage. The newly launched Mariachi ECoSistema (ECo) ensemble got the opportunity for the second year in a row to perform various traditional mariachi songs for the entire festival. If you somehow haven’t caught...
September 19, 2024
Who should perform at Kick-Off?
Yeehaw, it’s almost time for Kick-Off. As seniors who know everything, we’d like to humbly offer a few suggestions for who should perform. Kevin Miller Being married to President Becky must be great, but we want Kevin to have an opportunity to define himself. What would his act be? He’s major gifts officer, so one good option would be to throw money into the audience. He’s also a singer; perhaps a stirring rendition of One Direction’s “What Makes You Beautiful” could be in the cards? All we know is that he deserves some applause from students to get out of...
September 19, 2024
Bringing a spark back to orchestra
Jimin Seo brings three master’s degrees, a pending doctorate and a drive for making music to her new position as visiting assistant professor of music and orchestra conductor at Goshen College. Seo will debut as the GC Symphony Orchestra conductor at the Homecoming Music Gala on Oct. 5 in Sauder Concert Hall. The orchestra will present “Overture to Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” by Richard Wagner. “I’m excited for the audience to witness our Goshen College Symphony Orchestra — the beautiful playing as a group as well as all the individuals being fantastic musicians,” Seo said. Seo has a bachelor’s degree...
April 4, 2024
Fools’ Day fiddling
A nun, a devil and a G-string; not what you would expect at a traditional strings performance. This past Tuesday’s April Fools’ Day concert featured all three. The two-hour performance presented the musical prowess among both GC students and staff alike, including mesmerizing strumming, finger plucking and storytelling while guiding the audience through a “humourous walk through violin literature.” The recital opened with a brief introduction by Dustin George-Miller, Music Center office coordinator. Walking to the stage, he set the tone in a brightly colored blazer that sported eccentric shapes and was quick to offer a “thanks, Amazon,” for shipping...
March 14, 2024
International guitarists strum in Sauder
“International Guitar Night” made its stop at Sauder Concert Hall on Saturday, March 9. It was an exciting event featuring guitarists across the globe, as artists from Brazil to Australia graced the stage with a wide variety of musical stylings and groovy instruments. Luca Stricagnoli and his acoustic-style guitar opened the show with a vibrant cover of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck.” Stricagnoli says this is the fourth time he has hosted the show. The audience was mesmerized by his inventive fingerstyle techniques that provided a new and unique sound to his music. Stricagnoli then brought his own three-necked guitar onto the stage...
February 15, 2024
Music, together
For three afternoons a week, for an hour and a half (and two hours on Mondays), I forget about everything else going on in my life and walk into the Music Center, pull out my black folder, and start my vocal warmups. I’ve sung in GC’s low voice choir, Vox Profundi, every year of my college career. Now, over my time at this school, I’ve been a part of a good number of clubs, groups and extracurriculars. Don’t get me wrong: I love, love, love my work with The Record; I talk constantly about how much joy I get from...
February 15, 2024
Sherer Trio takes stage
This Sunday afternoon, Reith Recital Hall was filled with the sounds of passionate violin playing, rich cello tones and dramatic piano chords — the sounds of the Sherer Trio. The Sherer Trio was created in memory of Lon Sherer, the founder of the Goshen College Orchestra, and Kathryn Sherer, a piano professor at GC. It is composed of Solomia Soroka on violin, Matthew Hill on piano and Dato Machavariani on cello. The concert began with Beethoven’s Piano Trio in C minor, Op. 1, No. 3. Its fiery passages and mournful sections offered a dramatic conversation between the instruments. Next, the...
February 1, 2024
Potential Novelty joins BEE! the Band
Potential Novelty and The Loose Associates opened for BEE! The Band at GoDance studio in downtown Goshen this past weekend. The crowd was filled with Goshen College students and both bands found themselves thriving off their hometown roots. “Being back … it’s always fun to be playing in Goshen,” said Isaac Fisher ‘23 and BEE! band member. “Where we got our start in front of people who were there from the start and supporting us from the start.” The event took place over the span of three hours. “I think it went well,” said Jocsan Barahona Rosales, a junior music...
February 1, 2024
‘Music is a social art’
H. Roz Woll has been an assistant professor of music at Goshen College for three years. Some of her duties include giving private voice lessons, directing Voices of the Earth, teaching a Music and Social Change class, and being faculty adviser for the Queen Singers. Her involvement at GC has revolved around voice and performance, with an emphasis on social justice and change. Woll grew up in Chicago in Hyde Park, a diverse neighborhood which made her “more conscious of race than … a white person who grows up in a more typically … white town,” she said. “I’m a...