Georgia Southern University students gave riveting performances at the General Student Recital in the Betty Foy Sanders building on Monday afternoon.

Students from various music classes gathered on the stage of the Carol A. Carter Recital Hall to provide GSU students and community members with live performances of classical and operatic music from the early 19^th century to the early 21^st century.

“This is our chance to give music majors a wide variety of music in one recital. They’ll hear brass, voice, woodwinds and pianists all in one,” Dr. Karla Rocker, coordinator of collaborative piano, said.

As the performers nervously readied themselves backstage, singer Caitlin Long and pianist Karla Rocker took the stage first with an adventurous and spirited piece called Andante et Allegro by Ernest Chausson.

According to music composition major and trumpet player Tony Shelton, it takes an adequate amount of practice to have a smooth and superior recital. He separated the amount of time he spends rehearsing by “distant” and “immediate” preparation.

Shelton said, he starts preparing about six weeks in advance, and during those six weeks, he picks out a piece, listens to it over and over again, and starts “working it out section by section.” In his second phase of rehearsing, Shelton must have time to warm up about 30 minutes before he goes on stage to “loosen up for the actual performance.”

Apart from their approach to a successful performance, the musicians are able to take away some history from their numerous practice sessions.

“We learn about different time periods. It makes you more cultured than the average American,” Brian Duckworth, sophomore voice performance major, said.

Rocker would like the students to gain “recital etiquette” from performing. She likes to think of the General Student Recitals as a “lab for musicians.”

Rocker also said that the musician’s personality plays a big part in giving an exceptional performance.

Rocker said, “If you are going to do a slow, sad song, consider a season of your life that wasn’t so happy to give you the motivation and vice versa if it’s a joyful or happy piece.”

Music students seemed to find this to be an accurate concept because of the admiration of the audience. Sophomore music education major Sydney Sewell, who was required to go for her recital attendance class, said the recital was worth the grade. A player of the piano and alto saxophone herself, Sewell may know what good music is.

“I thought it was a well-prepared performance. It sounded very good,” Sewell said.

The General student recital provided a way for students to hear genres of music they would not generally hear this day and age. After listening to sounds of operatic voices and flugelhorns, the audience got a taste of what is to come for the rest of the semester.

Students can experience the same type of enjoyment in music at one of the next five recitals this season as well as the many performances that the Foy building has for diverse music lovers.