On Friday, Feb. 21, and Saturday, Feb. 22, Ross High School’s show choir program hosted the annual Legacy Championship. With 14 middle and high schools competing, 17 show choirs danced the night away in the RHS Auditorium. As a very widely attended event, the championship welcomed around a thousand spectators throughout the weekend.
Performers and staff served 12+ hour days at the school, handling both behind-the-scene situations and putting on jaw-dropping shows for their ecstatic audience. As a member of the Ross High Times journalism staff, I attended on Saturday night to watch several finals shows and experienced first-hand the positive energy surrounding show choir.
The behind-the-scene stars of the show were hardworking parent volunteers who had been working for months to plan the competition. A group of parents called the Steering Committee helped organize the event, while around 65 volunteers worked at the actual championship and helped make sure everything ran smoothly. Kendall Resseguie, RHS English teacher and Show Choir Assistant Director, mentioned that the championship is served by “different parents who are in charge of different aspects of it, like the food, the transportation, the organizing of the schedule, monitoring the halls and the students.”
The Ross Legacy Championship also serves as a fundraiser for the growing Ross Choirs program. Resseguie explained that because the profit from the event comes in through many different ways, they will not have revenue totals for about a month. She said, “All the money goes to the choir department and funding the show choir for years to come, and … buying new equipment [and] costumes.”
Alongside the fantastic shows, visitors to the Ross Legacy Championship enjoyed participating in the event and the amenities it offered. RHS hosted six food trucks and a volunteer-run snack and coffee shop. Visitors were also encouraged to use the CueLive app on their phones to participate in a live audience-powered light show during the preliminary awards on Saturday. Awards, held in the gym, also offered the audience an opportunity to dance among lights and RHS’s own DJ Christian D.
When asked about her thoughts on the overall atmosphere of the competition, Legacy singer/dancer Kailyn Ponder responded, “This was probably one of the best Legacy championships I’ve experienced. I just felt like everyone was so hype for each other. Awards [were] very fun this year [with] groups dancing in the middle the whole time, and everyone was cheering for each other.” Another Legacy singer/dancer, Eliza Mohr, described it as “so positive” and explained, “there’s something special about show choir that we all want each other to do the best. At the end of the day, we’re all competing, but … we want everyone to do their best.”
Being there myself on Saturday night, I felt the energy and unity of cheering with, talking to, and even singing with other audience and show choir members. Overall, the Ross Legacy Championship weekend was highly successful and a great source of entertainment and energy for the community. The dedication of the tri-state community to its show choir students came out in the excitement and joy felt by performers, tech members, staff, volunteers, and spectators throughout the weekend.
Congratulations to the Ross Choir program for putting on such a successful championship weekend. We hope to see everyone again at the Ross Legacy Championship next year!
