The Greatest Benefit That Choir Gave Me

I am a very shy person.

The statement above is a total understatement. I am completely and truly an introvert and I really hate interacting with human beings. Standing in front of people and speaking is one of those human interactions that I hate.
I have severe social anxiety and cannot start a conversation with anyone. I usually keep to myself in public settings and try to remain unnoticeable. Even though I am usually successful in being invisible, I always still get the feeling that everyone is staring at me and judging me for things that don't make any sense.
For example, I walk past a group of people who are most likely nice, normal people.
As I walk past them, a string of negative thoughts run through my head.
"Oh my god, I look so stupid. Why can't I walk correctly?" "See I told you not yo wear these pants today. They probably think you look so stupid." "Don't do that that with your hands. You look like an idiot."
Negative thought after negative thought runs through my head, all directed at myself.
"Please don't notice me," I think whenever I walk past anyone. "But they probably think I look like an idiot," is my next thought.

Don't get this wrong. I am NOT a pushover. I will fight back if needed but I just don't want to feel the need to fight in the first place.

I hate classes where the teachers bring the attention to me. They think I'm lonely or something in their class and so they want me to interact with others to "make some friends" or so I won't be so "lonely."

I don't want to talk to anyone! Not even you!

So please just teach me or whatever and leave me alone unless I ask you a question. Trust me.
If I need something, I WILL ask. But if not, please go away.
I really am not trying to be mean or anything. I understand that you're just trying to be nice to me and you want me to do well in your class, but honestly, the nicest thing you can do for me is leave me be and let me do my work solo instead of forcing me into groups of people that usually half-ass all their work and drop it all on me anyway.
I also hate having to stand in front of people and present a project about a topic that I truly do not care for.
I don't want to be seen. It aggravates me and makes me so anxious. I don't want to feel like I'm being dissected by the people watching me and have them judge every piece of me.
I know it seems like I'm being over-dramatic, but this is how I truly feel.

I am terrified of being the center of attention because the center is always being judged.

"Oh, that person is funny." "That person is so outgoing and friendly." "That person is such a great entertainer."

I am absolutely none of those things.

As a child, I hated being the center of attention. I didn't want to speak or sing in front of anyone. Not even my own family. Singing was something I loved, but I had no confidence in myself. I was okay with singing in front of strangers because they didn't know who I was and so they couldn't hurt me. Whatever they said, I wouldn't care because they're complete strangers. But my family could hurt me. My greatest fear was them pointing out my weaknesses and bringing them all to light so that everyone else could see too.
This IS something that they like to do quite a bit. Especially my mother and my oldest sister. They like to tell family friends, acquaintances, and random others about my weaknesses and things that they don't like about me. They've been doing that my whole life and it's turned me into who I am today.

Joining choir was one of the best things that I could have done. It brought out a confidence in me that I didn't know I had.
The choir teacher was very considerate of people's feelings and he did not allow rude comments about anyone's singing skill. It was a safe environment for me to do something that I really enjoyed.
Through this class, I was able to tap into this hidden confidence that has grown quite a bit. Slowly over the four years of being in choir, I became more and more gutsy.
I finally had the courage to sing a song for my friends and they continue to cheer me on when I tell them about performances, send them song covers, or achieve something new in my vocal lessons.
After that, I became brave enough to sing in front of my family. They give me a lot of support with my love for singing. It really helped bring up my confidence even more.

Choir revealed the first stepping stone of boldness inside me that I didn't even know existed. This has aided me so much in other aspects of my life. I cannot tell you how grateful I am to my high school choir teacher and to my choir members.

Honestly, writing this is making me emotional. I might've shed a tear or two while writing this

I'll end this now.

What's Our Part Again?

For harmonies, the teacher would go over our part one by one. He'd go over it once or twice and then expect us to know it at the snap of a finger. Harmonies can be difficult if you've never sang any before. They're especially difficult if it's a familiar song that you've sang a thousand times. Then the melody can sneak up as you're harmonizing and then suddenly you're asking, "What's our part again?"
I had a difficult time remembering some of our parts even as a senior in choir. What annoyed me most was that the teacher wouldn't realize that nobody in our section knew the part and there was only one person singing it. Maybe the reason sopranos seem so loud is because there's altos singing along with them.
We'd go over our part once and then three days later have a sectional. The problem was that there needed to be more than one sectional on certain songs but the teacher would only have that one. It made it really difficult for the people who were not used to harmonies to remember all of them. I have the feeling that if we'd just gone over them more often we would've been better as a section. That way the other sections would've stopped glaring at us whenever the whole choir was stopped so we could be told to sing louder.
Judgy eyes staring at us is really not helpful when learning. Especially since it's singing and many people are afraid of being judged for the singing. Usually we're a quiet group of singers and the thought of singing in front of other human beings is really scary. The fact that we didn't really know the part probably made us even less confident. Now we had to be afraid to be heard and afraid that we didn't know what we were doing.
I just wish that the teacher paid attention to these problems. A lot of problems would be solved if they took the time to fix them instead of pretending they don't exist.

The Struggles of Leading the Section

Being an alto in a choir is difficult. Especially in a high school choir. All the other sections think that our part is so easy. We don't have to screech out high notes that break glass or sound low notes that rumble through the earth. However, our parts are full of sharps, flats, and sudden changes in rhythm. Nobody can ever tell though because the other sections are singing too loud even though the sheet music says mezzo-piano.
Right now, I am in my senior year of high school and my experience in a high school choir has taught me A LOT. I've learned that usually the girls who are put in the alto section are the ones who are afraid of singing loudly. They are also afraid of any note higher than a G4 (although sometimes they're afraid of those too.) I was one of those people during my freshman year. I wasn't afraid of high notes but I was afraid of being heard. In fact, I used to try screeching out the E7 at the end of The Phantom of the Opera before I realized that it didn't really sound like music when I sang it (I only did it at home, never at school.)
During my freshman and sophomore year, there were older girls in the alto section that knew the parts and sang very loudly, and I would always try my best to listen to them, but I could never hear them even if they were sitting right next to me because the sopranos were so loud.
When my junior year came around, those older girls had just graduated so we were stuck with a section of quiet altos who didn't quite know the parts. I sat right in the middle of the section and I heard absolutely nothing around me. Three of us knew the majority of our part but three voices in the alto section will definitely not be enough to defeat the loud and proud voices of the sopranos.
During senior year, I was the only alto to have lasted four years in choir and I was the one who had to lead the section. I tried my best but my lone voice was drowned out by the sopranos who were across the room from us. I really did try. Another problem was that the altos would get confused and start to sing the soprano parts instead. When I first started choir, I asked to be an alto but later on, when the director would reevaluate our voices, he would keep placing me back into the section because I was the alto with the most experience.

There were about four more altos than sopranos but the only sound that I could hear from my section was my voice. Occasionally, I did hear other voices but that was a rare occurrence.
During our Halloween concert, also known as the "Creepy Concert," we sang a medley of The Phantom of the Opera (there were no E7's, thank god), and my sister-in-law recorded the whole ten minutes of it. I had caught a cold recently and my voice was not quite up to par, but I sang as loudly as I could. My ears felt like they were stuffed with cotton and I couldn't hear myself very well. I couldn't hear the other altos either. Near the end of the medley, my voice cracked a little bit because of the air pressure I was using to try and project my voice. I thought to myself, 'well nobody heard that because I can't hear myself well so I must not be that loud.'
Later on, I listened to the recording and to my horror, I could hear myself very well. At the end of the video, you could hear my voice waver a bit when it cracked. That video hurts my soul. Not only because you could hear my voice crack, but because only I could be heard singing the alto part. My voice passed as the whole section on its own. That might seem like a good thing but honestly, if the whole section was louder instead of just one voice, the crack could've been covered up. If one person makes a mistake, usually covered up by the rest of the section so that the audience won't hear it. However, I was the only one who could be heard and so my mistake was heard fairly well.
It is so very difficult to be the loud alto. If I just lowered my voice a little bit during rehearsals, the director would stop everything and tell the whole section to be louder. That meant no breaks from trying to project more loudly than the sopranos for me.
Although being the only loud alto in my choir was stressful for me, I felt proud that I was the loud one. Knowing the music and my parts was a source of pride for me. I am proud that I was a part of the alto section for four years. While the sopranos were proud of singing high notes, I am proud of all the low harmonies full of flats, sharps, and random rhythm changes I had to sing.
Even though being the leader of the section was difficult, I am proud of being a loud alto. <3