Lane Community College Chamber Choir photo taken by Remi Steeves
LCC music students display their talents
By Remi Steeves
Fall Term 2025 will be closing out this year with a magnificent celebration of musical talent: the Winter Showcase. According to Matthew Svoboda, Lane Community College’s choir director of 19 years, students majoring in music are offered the opportunity to “showcase what [skills] they’ve learned in lessons,” which are then demonstrated in each term’s musical showcase taking place on the Friday of week 10. This term’s showcase will be Dec. 5, at noon, in the auditorium of Ragozzino Hall.
Svoboda says the showcase is composed mainly of music majors who are taking individual lessons, and priority is given to students who have been enrolled at LCC for longer. He says the showcase demonstrates “all kinds of music,” and is about 50 minutes long.
Students are selected to participate through a series of checkpoints after an initial advertisement to all music majors. First, the student’s individual lesson teacher asks the student at Week 6 if the student feels they are ready to participate. If the student says yes, the student and teacher work together throughout the rest of the term to prepare for the showcase.
If the instructor deems the student ready by the end, they sign off on their participation and send a confirmation to Svoboda. The student then rehearses with an accompanist, and the accompanist signs off on whether or not they feel the student is ready.
Determining whether or not a student is ready to perform is about more than their ability to read notes on a sheet of music. Svoboda says it’s about whether they can “express the meaning [and] musicality of the music” through their performance.
The Winter Showcase is free for anyone who wishes to attend. It is run by Svoboda as the stage manager and by the technical crew directed by Emily Bolivar. After hearing the musicians practice through the halls all term, Bolivar says she’s excited to “see what everyone’s been working on.”
The 2025 Winter Showcase is noon Dec. 5, in the auditorium at Ragozzino Hall on the LCC campus.
