Music and Worship Arts Conference at Lake Junaluska

We had a such a rich and interesting experience at the Music and Worship Arts Conference at Lake Junaluska. The church graciously made it possible for Stan to attend this for the first time, and he really enjoyed the week. He was in the adult choir and attended lots and lots of sessions. Carrie Beth attended many sessions too, and she sat in on lots of children's rehearsals. Olivia and David participated in the children's music camp. David was in the drum class in the morning and Olivia was in the 1st-3rd grade choir in the morning. They both had phenomenal directors--so creative and just teeming with tons of great strategies and techniques. The week was bursting with great musical moments. We heard the Raleigh Ringers, a handbell choir like none I've ever heard before! We also got to hear the famous Junaluska Singers which is almost always a surefire wonderful concert-and this year was no disappointment, to be certain! The week came to a close on Thursday night. That afternoon we saw all of the children's perfomances--remarkable!!! Olivia and David both made us so proud. The adult choir blew me away! They were under the direction of Eric Nelson who is the director of choral music at Emory. It was like musical dessert buffet, and it got richer and richer as the evening went on. The middle school and high school choirs were also a delight. It was a neat experience. We're on the fence as to whether we'll attend again, and our reasons why could consume a whole other blog post, but over all it was a tremendously helpful, special experience. Friday was our free day, and we took a brief walk around part of the lake, made the mandatory visit to Mast General Store in downtown Waynesville to visit the Candy barrels, and then we hurried home to finish off the leftovers and then scooted back out to see Cars 2. Carrie Beth, Stan and I stayed up late Friday night trying to go over everything they had learned and discussing how we could/couldn't implement various ideas, etc. We left Saturday morning after a breakfast at Joey's, and we headed home full of excitement for how the Lord might use all of this new knowledge and experience in our own children's and adult choirs at home! Thank you, Lord for this fabulous week!