By Anne Marie Wright, Heartland Contributor
Webb City show choirs after a successful day at Seneca. (Webb City Choir Booster Club/Facebook)
A couple events that take place a while before the regular season have become tradition in Missouri.
The Neosho Show Choir Festival and Stars Over Seneca competition take place in November every year, and they provide Missouri choirs with a great space to show off parts of their shows before the main season starts.
Of course, this early on, very few choirs present their complete set, so it’s more of a preview opportunity.
At Neosho’s festival, choirs are given the chance to perform their shows in a non-competition setting and meet with a clinician afterwards, but no placements are awarded. Possibly the best part of this event is that the groups are able to get experience performing as a team in front of other choirs and directors before they perform in front of a panel of judges. This year, 19 groups were able to showcase selections from their set at this festival, including some big 5A names like Carthage Soundwave and host choir Neosho Choraleers, and some smaller-school names, such as East Newton Patriot Singers and Cassville Center Stage. This year, the festival was held in Neosho High’s new performing arts center, which opened before the 2023-24 school year.
Stars Over Seneca, on the other hand, is a small-scale competition hosted by Seneca
Starstruck. Last weekend, eight groups competed for an early-season win to their names. All the competing groups hailed from southwest Missouri. Webb City brought four groups - all three high school groups plus a middle school group. Nevada brought both of its high school choirs, and groups from McDonald County and Mt. Vernon rounded out the field.
In the single-gender division, Nevada Treble Effects came in third place, with Maddie
Jeffries, their ballad soloist, earning one of two best soloist awards for the day. Webb City
DoMENance snagged the second place spot, bested only by their sister choir, Bella Vocé.
DoMENance’s Gavin Barnes earned the second best soloist award of the competition with his “Chattahoochee” solo in their second number.
Mount Vernon was the only choir in the 3A division, and they put up a solid performance with their Bonnie and Clyde-themed show. In the 4A/5A division, McDonald County Rhapsody ‘N Rhythm took third place, along with the Judge’s Choice award for Best Tone. Nevada Soundsational Singers won second place with their Scooby Doo-themed show, and Webb City Singers won the division with their Friday night football homecoming show.
Seneca chose not to include a finals round this year, so placements were awarded based off the sole daytime round. At the end of the day, the rankings stood as follows: in overall third place came Nevada Soundsational Singers, also taking Best Choreography. Webb City Bella Vocé secured the first runner-up title, holding strong to their reputation of ranking with the big dog mixed groups. And finally, Webb City Singers, the reigning champions of Stars Over Seneca, earned the first place title. In addition to their first Grand Champ of the season, Singers also brought home a plethora of caption awards, including Best Vocals, Crowd Favorite, and two Judge’s Choice awards: Best Flipping, awarded to senior Emma Cox, and Most Feral Performer, awarded to junior Addy Moss.
These two events provide a valuable window into the season to come for Missouri groups, with over 20 choirs performing a portion of their show. Based off what was on stage, 2025 is shaping up to be quite the year!
Comments