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Texoma Welcome Back Letter Fall 2024

Greetings, Texoma Colleagues,

I hope this finds you well and that you have all had wonderful summers. 

I am writing today with quite a bit of information. Please take time to read this carefully as there are several significant changes and announcements, particularly in regards to the Fall Conference and Auditions.

  1. CONFERENCE DETAILS: The Fall Conference and Auditions will be held November 6-9, 2024 at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, TX. The Singer of the Year Competition prelims will be held Wednesday, November 6, and the rest of the conference and auditions are November 7-9. The auditions are the Classical National Student Auditions categories for high school ages, college, advanced, and adult. In the Spring, we will hold online auditions for Musical Theater (all ages), Commercial Music (all ages), and Children and Youth Divisions (Classical, Musical Theater.
  2.  CONFERENCE GUEST ARTIST: I am thrilled to announce that the guest artist for the conference will be soprano Nicole Heaston with pianist Kevin Miller. The recital will be on Friday, November 8 at 7:30PM in the Gaertner Performing Arts Center Concert Hall on the SHSU campus. If you happened to attend the National Conference in Knoxville this summer, you may have heard the stunning recital presented by Mr. Miller and tenor Lawrence Brownlee.
  3. CONFERENCE OPERA: On Thursday, November 7, Sam Houston State University will mount a production of Twenty-Four (or The Cure for Love) — created by Tony Boutté (SHSU) and Chas Rader-Shieber (Curtis Institute) — performed by SHSU Opera Theater.
  4. CONFERENCE MASTER CLASSES: The master clinicians for this year are mezzo soprano Suzanne Mentzer and tenor Albert Lee. To submit a singer for performance on one of the master classes, please fill out this form by Wednesday, October 2nd. Teachers who have not had a student perform on a recent master class are especially encouraged to apply.
  5. NEW AWARD: I am THRILLED to announce a new award debuting this year at the Fall Auditions. The Barbara Hill Moore Award for the Best Presentation of an Art Song composed by a Woman of Color has been established and funded by James Rodriguez to celebrate the many contributions of Barbara Hill Moore to the Texoma Region and the singing world at large, as well as to encourage and celebrate art songs by women of color. Prizes: First Place $250; Second Place $150; Third Place $100. This award will be given to singers from the 4th and 5th Year Treble and TBB Categories (CL7B and CL8B) who include an art song composed by a woman of color in their Texoma Classical National Student Audition repertoire selections. More information on the award and the process is here. 
  6. ADULT CATEGORIES–NOW COMPETITIVE:  In response to an increased number of students entering the adult avocational and adult non-traditional categories, the Texoma Board of Control has voted to move these categories to being competitive (rather than for comments only). These categories now operate as all other categories and have semi-finals, finals, and prize money given. The prize award levels are $85 (1st), $75 (2nd), $65 (3rd), $55 (4th), $45 (5th) Adult students may still opt to enter for comments only; in this case they would, only need to attend their prelim round audition and they would not receive scores. Avocational students are neither pursuing nor holding a degree in music and not working as professional musicians and Non-Traditional students are those that are pursuing or holding degrees in music and whose age or level of study falls outside the limits of other categories.
  7. NEW LIMIT ON STUDENT SUBMISSIONS: In order to streamline a bulky policy on how many students a teacher is allowed to bring, the Texoma Board of Control has made some updates. Teachers are now allowed to bring a maximum of 8 college, advanced, and adult students (rising from the previous 6). In addition, there is no longer a separate policy allowing for up to 6 extra non-competitive adult students. The attendance policy in total is:
    1. Each teacher may enter: A maximum of eight (8) students total in the College, Advanced, Adult divisions
    2. AND a maximum of six (6) students in the Hall Johnson Categories 
    3. AND an unlimited number of students in the High School divisions 
    4. Teachers may enter one extra singer in the Collegiate/Advanced/Adult divisions for each High School and College/Advanced finalist they had in the previous year’s student auditions, up to 14 students total (in the Collegiate/Advanced/Adult divisions).
  8. POSTER PRESENTATIONS: Texoma NATS welcomes proposals for poster presentations at the regional conference. Undergraduate and Graduate students are also encouraged to apply provided they are sponsored by a Texoma NATS teacher. Please submit a 250 word abstract of your proposed topic in MS Word to Dr. James D. Rodriguez at James.Rodriguez@tcu.edu by Sept. 15. Submissions will be reviewed by a panel and notifications will be made by Oct. 1. The Poster Presentation session will be held on Friday, November 8 from 4:00 to 5:30 pm. SHSU will be able to provide a limited number of easels for the presentations. Posters should be able to fit and stand on a standard presentation easel. 
  9. ADJUSTMENT OF THE LIEDERKRANZ AWARD: As we further refine our special awards to meet the needs of the region, it has become obvious that the Liederkranz Award was too unwieldy to manage with so many singers being eligible. Going forward, only the singers in 9 and 10 (Treble and TBB Advanced) are eligible. Singers in SOTY/NATSAA and 7B and 8B are no longer eligible. More information on this award is available here. 
  10. SINGER OF THE YEAR: In Texoma, in even years, we host the Edward Baird Singer of the Year competition. Details regarding the competition, eligibility, and registration can be found here. Registrations will be accepted beginning Monday, August 26, and will close Wednesday, October 2nd. The registration form can be found here. 
  11. AMERICAN NEGRO SPIRITUALS COMPETITION: The National Student Auditions alters between the American Negro Spirituals Competition and the Hall Johnson Competition. This year, is the year for the American Negro Spirituals Competition, and these categories will be held at the fall conference. Details on this category, repertoire, and eligibility are here.  
  12. AUDITION REGISTRATION PROGRAM: We will return to using AuditionWare this year, while the AuditionNow program works on upgrades. AuditionWare is the program we used for the 10 years prior to AuditionNow. Access will be through www.nats.org Registration will open Wednesday, September 11 and close Wednesday, October 9.
  13. AUDITION INFORMATION: Updated audition information has all been placed into our new online document. You can find this on our website, here.  
  14. REPERTOIRE DATABASE: Unsure of how a piece is categorized for the purposes of Auditions (is it an aria or an art song, for example) or looking for inspiration as you assign new repertoire for the semester? Be sure to check out Daniel Hunter-Holly’s incredible database of repertoire (including frequency) that has been submitted for auditions for the past 8 years. 
  15. FACEBOOK GROUP: Keep up to date on the latest news, get reminders, and stay connected to your colleagues by joining our Texoma NATS Members Only Group. Click the link here to join, or search for the group in the search bar in Facebook. 

As we move forward through the semester, it will be a tremendous help to our volunteer officers and conference hosts if questions are directed to the appropriate person from the start. To assist with this, below is a list of important contacts. Please do look for answers yourself first on our website, and asking on our Facebook page is also a quick way to get general answers. 

​​For questions regarding the Student Auditions: Casey L. Carter (ccarter@collin.edu) Texoma Auditions Chair/DFW Auditions Chair 

For questions regarding Student Auditions Repertoire: Stephanie Beinlich (stephanie.beinlich@gmail.com) Texoma Assistant Auditions Chair 

For questions regarding payment issues: Gregory Brooks (gregory.brookes@ttu.edu) Treasurer/Registrar 

For questions regarding Singer of the Year: Melinda Brou (melinda.brou@tamuk.edu) Texoma Region Governor 

For questions regarding the Conference Artist Series:Jessica Rosas Posada (jessica.posada@enmu.edu) Artist Series Coordinator 

For questions regarding the Texoma website: Mikhail Smigelski (​​smigels.m@gmail.com) Webmaster

For questions regarding the host site: Emily Howes Heilman (ech035@shsu.edu) Sam Houston State University Site Coordinator

For questions regarding poster presentations: James D. Rodriguez (James.Rodriguez@tcu.edu) Poster Presentation Coordinator