"Being a part of something special does not make you special. Something is special because you are a part of it."

Yes, I know, I just quoted Glee, and I know there's nothing cheesier I could possibly do to begin a post about choir.

But, really, I can't think of a better way to say what I felt this past week.

Today I returned from a week long tour with my college choir, and if there's one thing I know for sure, I am definitely a part of something special. However, there was something magical about this choir tour that made it so much better than any experience I've had before.

I made the exact same trip last year,but with a different end destination. The same week of singing in high schools and churches, staying with host families, spending hours on a tour bus, and then ultimately navigating a big city, and, of course, I had a great time. This year's trip, however, was in an entirely different league.

I couldn't figure out what made this trip so different. Maybe it was the music, I thought, or my newly-attained upperclassman status. Maybe it was being more comfortable in my own skin and voice after a year of self-discovery. Maybe it was having another year's worth of knowledge under my belt--surely classes in music theory, aural skills, and conducting must have helped me have a better experience.

The comparison lies in one piece of music: Eric Whitacre's "Sleep." I fell in love with this piece of music so many years ago, and was finally lucky enough to perform it with my choir last year. This year, the senior class chose to bring it back. Because of this, I have two years' worth of recordings of my choir singing it.

The piece itself is glorious. It's a masterpiece of incredible harmony combined with poetry and musicality that is unlike any other. Both recordings are very well done, and they sound very similar. You can tell that it's the same choir, with most of the same voices, performing both years.

But only one makes me tear up when I listen to it.

It's apparent that I have been part of something special for two years now, so why does this second year carry so much weight?

The people.

It's not the notes on the page that make you feel the music with the very center of your being, it's standing next to your best friend as you sing those notes, and hearing the incredible dissonance of your first and second-soprano parts swell and clash. It's singing "Java Jive" to an audience of high school kids and having so much fun because you make eye contact with your best friend as he says the word "potato" in stead of "ba de do." It's performing the King Singers' arrangement of "Blackbird" and grinning because you're watching your friends dance to the music you're making in the back pew of the church doing silly bird hands. It's having to leave out two full lines of "Nelly Bly" because your choir director winked at you after the line "give the mush a turn" and you can't contain your laughter.

My choir is not special because we sing great music. Every choir sings great music. Great music is special in it's own right. My choir is special because of the bonds we share with one another in and out of rehearsal. It is special because of each and every individual member, even the ones that don't get along sometimes, and even the ones that will roll their eyes at me for writing this cheesy sentimental article.

So, no, being a part of something special does not make you special.

Something is special because you are a part of it.