On December 19, the students of Piano 1, 2, and 3 demonstrated the skills they’ve learned over the past semester in front of friends and family in the auditorium.

Each student performed a Christmas song in honor of the season. Mr. Damon Dye, the teacher of the class, gave his students a variety of songs to choose from in mid-November, based on how far they had progressed in the class. While mastering the song was the objective for each student, Mr. Dye also holds this recital every December to help students get used to performing in front of audiences.

“When you get into the real world, you will have to perform all the time; you’ll interview for jobs, present a proposal to coworkers, or, in this case, play a song. For some of my students, this was their first time they will get up on stage and perform, so it’s important to give them this experience,” Dye said.

For most of the students, the audience could sense how nervous they were as they introduced themselves and their songs, but, as they played, those nerves faded away as most performed with little to no mistakes.

“I felt a little uncomfortable when I walked on to the stage with everyone’s eyes focused me, but I found my flow as soon as I began playing considering I had been practicing my piece every day during the school week for a month now,” said senior Colin Choudhary, who played “Silver Bells”

The audience, including senior Gerald Fattah, who was invited by Choudhary, enjoyed the recital as well.

“I was really impressed by how adept each person was when playing their song. I could really tell a lot of hard work was put into each performing,” said Fattah.

As a reward for their efforts, Mr.Dye decided to surprise his class with donuts.

Mr. Dye said, “They [piano students] deserved donuts. It takes a lot of mental strength, regardless of how hard you’ve worked, to perform in front of people you know as well as don’t know. They should be proud of themselves.”