On April 30th, 2011, my high school show choirs had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to compete at FAME Indianapolis for the Show Choir National Cup. We had a successful competition year beforehand, with all first places at six local competitions, but this was a chance to put our name and town of Brea, California "on the map." At the qualifying round, held March 5th in Hollywood, Spellbound (our all-girls group) won Grand Champion with the highest score of the night, out of thirteen unisex and mixed groups! This was the determining factor in our decision to attend Finals, because a unisex division was created because of the group's "phenomenal performance" (according to the judges).
But a national competition seemed unattainable; to send everyone would cost over $100,000 that we didn't have. But almost immediately our dedicated "choir moms" banded together and miraculously fundraised almost all of the cost. We also created a "Perform-A-Thon" one week before we left, a three-hour practice in order to raise some money still needed. That practice was definitely the toughest we'd had all year, but we were determined to to "wow" the judges and move the audience with a precisely-practiced performance.
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