Digging Deeper

On February 3rd six hornets competed in the UIL Piano soloist competition at TAMUK. All six competitors from Flour Bluff High School received the highest score of one and are advancing to state in Austin, Texas.

The competitors are Meredith Gayanilo, Emily Chapa, Joey Liu, Evey Illustrisimo, Jessica Hu, and Michelle Wang. These Hornets have put a great amount of work into their pieces and are very excited to advance to state. 

Earning one was a very proud moment for them and their parents. “To me, the piece I chose wasn’t as advanced as other contestants. Since it was slower and a much more romantic piece, I felt that I was capable of exerting as much emotion and feelings through my piece compared to someone with a faster, more complicated piece. Earning a one showed that I put a good amount of work into my practice time leading up to the competition,” said Gayanilo.  

For some background, Gayanilo started at a very young age and grew through many years of playing. “I started playing piano when I was 8 years old. My grandma was a piano teacher, and my mom played the piano as well. I  also learned how to play the violin at 6 years old, and at that age, I didn’t mind learning another instrument.” Being multi-talented, Gayanilo is a very strong contestant going into their state competition. 

Similar to Gayanilo, Jessica Hu started playing at a very young age too. “I started playing when I was 6 and my love for piano and music has only grown since then. Especially during COVID and the year after, I had a lot of time to just play and experiment with different pieces that I liked.”

The next goal for these students is to spark the minds of the judges. Be able to create joy out of their piece and their music. They want to make the judges feel the music tempo and how mastering their piece can create such beauty. 

“The piece that I chose was one of my favorites because it is such a slow mindful piece. It’s really calm at first and speeds up in the end. The dynamics of it turns around the viewpoint of the piano and expresses just a beautiful feeling,” said Chapa.

With constant practice from these students, they have already looked into the future of the next UIL competition and how improvement is right down the road.

“Going into this competition in regards to UIL, I’m going to use the next few months to master the piece because there is always room for improvement. At state, I just hope to play well and enjoy myself more during my performance. I hope to give the judges some music to enjoy as well,” said Hu.

The team will compete for State in May so as time passes by they are doing their best to always improve their performance. Spending hours with their piano teacher and practicing over and over, these students plan to bring their A-game to dominate the competition.