Vocal Alliance takes on Connecticut

One of DHS’ singing groups, Vocal Alliance, departed on Saturday, April 26th for an educational and enjoyable weekend performing at the 2025 NAfME (National Association for Music Education) Eastern Division Conference in Hartford, Connecticut.

The NAfME Eastern Division Conference hosts the annual performances of the All-Eastern Honors Ensembles, which include 600 students from the Northeast who scored the highest in their state for their respective All-State festivals. 

Some of these All-Eastern Honors Ensembles include a mixed choir, treble choir, concert band, jazz band and modern band. Piper Brett, a junior at Danvers High School and member of Vocal Alliance, was talented enough to be accepted into (and perform with) this year’s All-Eastern honors mixed choir. The conference also hosts many musical workshops and presentations held by college music programs and school teachers from all over the Northeast.

Vocal Alliance is a small and selective social justice singing group that mainly performs pieces with messaging about acceptance, love and equality. The goal of Vocal Alliance is not just to move people with their music, but to move people towards action. Vocal Alliance performs at many social justice events around Danvers every year, such as Trans Day of Visibility, Light the Night Purple (substance abuse awareness), Pride, and the Martin Luther King day celebration.

Vocal Alliance was selected by the NAfME curators to perform after submitting a video demonstrating their skills. The six current members of the group include juniors Dailin Martinez, Ella Guitard, Kaelin Hampe, Bella Drakos, and Piper Brett, and sophomore Brooke Willichoski. Although Wilichoski couldn’t make it to Hartford as she was moving on to the DECA nationals, freshman Emma Anderson was kind enough to step in, learn the group’s set, and attend the trip to the NAfME Eastern Division Conference in her place.

 Vocal Alliance arrived in Hartford the morning of Saturday, April 26th with their chaperone and director, Mr. Alex Grover, and performed at noon at the convention center of the conference. After the six song set was performed, many audience members described feelings of hope and appreciation, and a few came by to congratulate or recruit the group for other future performances.

The members of Vocal Alliance, who are all close friends, had a fun time throughout the weekend-long conference, and were kept very busy by their director. On Saturday after their performance, Mr. Grover brought them to a folk dance workshop for teachers called “Folk Dance as a Springboard to Student Creativity” taught by Danvers elementary teachers Mr. Griff Gall and Ms. Jennifer Dennett. The group also went to the All-Eastern jazz and modern band ensembles concert. The next morning, they were happy to attend the All-Eastern treble choir and mixed choir ensembles performances, as they got to see their fellow group member, Brett, perform as a tenor in the mixed choir.

The trip was a great opportunity for Vocal Alliance to perform in front of an appreciative audience and publicize their music. The group is aiming for this trip to be the start to a series of many moving performances around New England during the ’25-’26 school year.