February 22, 2019 

Granbury High School students Ian Cone, Paige Quillen, and Andrew Walters performed with All-State ensembles to close the Texas Music Educators Association (TMEA) state conference at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio on February 16, 2019.

Cone, a senior, performed with Class 6A All-State Symphonic Band, while Quillen, a junior, was second chair in the Class 5A Sinfonietta Orchestra.  They are both French horn players. 

A senior, Walters performed with the All-State Mixed Choir.  He was seated in fourth chair among Bass 1 singers. 

Both Cone and Walters previously qualified for the state ensembles.  This marks Walters’ third appearance; he was in the All-State Men’s Choir in 2016 as a freshman and in the mixed chorus last year.  Cone performed in the All-State Symphonic Band in 2017 as a sophomore. 

Leading these concerts were premiere conductors from around the world, including:  Steven Davis, Director of Bands and Wind Ensembles at the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s Conservatory of Music and Dance; Maria Guinand, a Grammy-nominated Venezuelan choral conductor from the University Simón Bolívar (All-State Mixed Choir); Gary Lewis, Director of Orchestral Studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. 

All-State is the highest honor for a Texas music student.  The two students were chosen through a competitive process involving several levels of auditions held this school year throughout the state.  Individual musicians perform selected music for a panel of judges who rank each instrument or voice part.  From this ranking, a select group advances from each of the thirty-three regions to compete against others in nine area competitions. 

Only five hundred are selected for the state ensembles from among almost 60,000 band, choir, and orchestra students that initially entered the multi-level musical competition.