The Greene County High School Vocal Jazz ensemble dominated at this past Saturday’s contest.

According to Director David Heupel, Ram Jive traveled to North Polk High School and was crowned Class 3A champion, along with senior Gavin Vander Linden was named the Outstanding Soloist Award. He talks about the lineup of music that starts with a swing tune with “No Moon At All” by Peter Eldridge and Darmon Meader with Vander Linden and Ava Schilling as soloists. The second song is a lower ballad-style song with “Detour Ahead” by Paris Rutherford, with the final piece, “Rollercoaster” by Kerry Marsh, which is a contemporary jazz-style song; and Heupel points out is nothing like this ensemble has done before.

“It just flies, it really moves. Malachi Hinote, our drummer, gets to do a little more of his style of groove on the drumming for it. It’s just a lot of really tough harmonies and it features Daniele Madsen pretty much throughout the whole thing. (It’s) Probably the hardest one we’ve tried to bite off over these years. It’s a tough one, but it’s a lot of fun.”  

The next performance for Ram Jive is at the All That Jazz Festival on February 23rd at the high school auditorium.